concerns to Reiner who then began working with Japanese prosecutors. Reiner has stated that were it not for Sakoda's persistence the case might have been relegated to the unsolved, or cold case files. Miura was convicted of the murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment in Japan in 1994, upon which he promptly appealed to Tokyo High Court. After four years of deliberation, Tokyo High Court overturned the conviction and the resulting sentence, because they were not able to identify the assailant and thus could not prove conspiracy. In 2003, the Supreme Court also acquitted him of the charge, saying "high court's judgment that there is reasonable doubt that he conspired with an unidentified person to kill his late wife is reasonable." Under a 2004 California law, if convicted, the time already served would be credited against any potential sentence. Arrest by the U.S. authorities and death California authorities learned that Miura frequently visited U.S. territory on business, and waited until he made a trip to the island of Saipan in the U.S. Northern Mariana Islands, where he was arrested on February 22, 2008. In Saipan, he began fighting extradition to California, and hired lawyers both on Saipan and in Los Angeles. A former federal prosecutor noted that the 27 years since the crime could help Miura's defense. "Witness memories don't get better with time," she said in an interview with the International Herald Tribune. Los Angeles prosecutors announced that they identified the actual sniper, but there was no move by the prosecutors to arrest the deadly sniper. The legal battle to avoid getting extradited to California continued until late September when the Los Angeles Superior Court dropped the murder charges, due to prohibition of double jeopardy, but found conspiracy charges, which do not have capital punishment, valid. Miura gave up the fight to extradition and was transported to Los Angeles, California, arriving in the early morning of October 10, 2008, That night, according to an announcement by the police, he committed suicide by hanging himself in his cell. Although an independent pathologist hired by the defense attorney stated the evidence showed Miura was murdered while in jail, the Los Angeles County coroner ruled that the cause of death was suicide. References 1947 births 2008 deaths 20th-century Japanese businesspeople Suicides by hanging in California People from Yamanashi Prefecture Japanese people imprisoned abroad People who committed suicide in prison custody Japanese