In the 18 days Runa spent in a police cell in Japan, she wrote about how much she yearned to come home.
The teenager missed her mother’s cooking, her hugs, and their small, ordinary rituals of life together – reading, shopping, and singing.
“Please, I beg you. I want to see my mom,” she scribbled in a notepad given to her during her detention, seen by CNN.
Runa’s incarceration – and death months after her release – is now the subject of a lawsuit brought by her mother against Hyogo Prefectural Police alleging unlawful arrest and detention. Proceedings opened this week in a case that’s shone a spotlight on Japan’s treatment of juvenile suspects.
