Four marines accused of gang rape may be court-martialed

HIROSHIMA (Kyodo) Four U.S. Marines who were accused of gang-raping a Japanese woman last October have been charged with the crime under the U.S. Uniform Code of Military Justice, the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni in Yamaguchi Prefecture said Thursday.

While the U.S. military is in the process of deciding whether to court-martial the four, who are based at Air Station Iwakuni, Japanese prosecutors dropped gang-rape charges against them in November.

The U.S. military pressed charges against the four men in December for sexually assaulting the woman, stealing cash from her and disobeying orders, the station said.

The 20-year-old woman said at a preliminary hearing at the station Thursday that she was raped by the four men, who range between 20 and 39 years of age.

The hearing is being held to determine whether the four will be tried by court martial. The four men were present at the hearing but did not testify.

The woman said that although she agreed to have sex with one of the men, the other three joined in and she was raped by all four in a car.

Asked why she did not tell police previously that she had consented to have sex with one of the four, she said, "I was ashamed of behaving rashly."

After the four men raped her, they threw her bag, shoes and other belongings away from the car and stole almost all of the ¥12,000 she had in her wallet, the woman said.

Hiroshima Prefectural Police had opened a case into the allegation on suspicion that the four men forced the woman into a car, raped her and took money from her purse in the city of Hiroshima in the early hours of Oct. 14, 2007.

But police did not arrest the marines because there were inconsistencies in the woman's remarks. Instead, they decided to send their investigative reports to prosecutors in accordance with the Code of Criminal Procedure.

In November, Hiroshima prosecutors decided not to indict the four.