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Carlos Ghosn: How I escaped Japan

203 points by phpnode 5y ago

indigodaddy 5y ago
“ Documentary series Storyville details his extraordinary rise and sudden fall in Carlos Ghosn: The Last Flight which will be shown on BBC 4 on Wednesday 14 July.” ^ Hoping this doc will make its way to American television.. maybe PBS/Frontline?
- Simulacra 5y ago
  You can view BBC programing by setting up Tor to go through the U.K.
  - liberalasshats 5y ago
    Thats sound advice not sure why you get downvoted, a niche vpn would probably also work, or you can can torrent it
    - jwdunne 5y ago
      Not so sound when we Brits have to pay a license fee by law for owning a TV that can tune in to any public channel just to fund the BBC!
      - _0ffh 5y ago
        Sounds downright fair in comparison to Germany, where you have to pay a TV license fee for having a home, no TV set required.
      - throwaway2037 5y ago
        As a non-British person living outside the United Kingdom, I also find it frustrating that I cannot pay to watch some things on the Beeb! (Steve McQueen - Small Axe!)
  - LeoPanthera 5y ago
    I had no idea this was even possible. Can you choose the physical location of your exit nodes?
CRConrad 5y ago
How come this fucker gets to not only brag about evading justice, in stead of being rightly vilified for it, but is even given a platform to brag from by the most prestigious of media corporations?!? Why hasn't whatever country he's in -- Britain? -- clapped him in irons and extradited him the hell back to Japan? Are they even officially condoning criminals escaping justice as long as they're rich, these days? (Or is Ghosn giving interviews from some closet in the embassy of a third-world country where he's holed up, as seems traditional for fugitives on the lam in Britain nowadays?)
- fotta 5y ago
  > Lebanon does not have an extradition treaty with Japan so Mr Ghosn has been allowed to remain there.
  - CRConrad 5y ago
    Second try, having calmed down a little: Yes, sure, he's run off to some country that has no extradition (and which conveniently for him also happens to be his native country). But still: So what -- why is this feted in international media, and not condemned? Other criminals that hare off to avoid extradition are not written up as heroes, are they? Or should they be? The only two exceptions that come to mind are a) Ronnie Biggs -- but the semi-cultish veneration this simple (and by all accounts rather bumbling) train robber received from large parts of the British public is, AIUI, now mostly (and IMO quite rightly) regarded as misguided; and b) Edward Snowden. But he blew the whistle on important wrongdoings by a superpower's military -- he did not commit any crime for personal gain. What Ghosn did was the exact opposite: cooking corporate bookkeeping, fiddling his taxes, and generally enriching himself. He is, AFAICS, just a modern-day John DeLorean, only on a much grander scale. So I still really, really just don't get it: YTF is this so widely reported on in such approving tones? He's a criminal evading justice. Surely this ought to be deplored, not revered?
  - CRConrad 5y ago
    Noticed that on my second read; didn't make it all the way through on the first. Yeah, so he didn't have to go to the embassy.
sleepytimetea 5y ago
So, the justice system in Japan enforces additional restrictions after a person is out on bail ? He couldn't meet his wife seems like an unreasonable condition for someone out on bail. Also, is the justice system in Japan so backed up that he would have to wait years for it go to trial ?
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago
  > He couldn't meet his wife seems like an unreasonable condition for someone out on bail It’s also not ridiculous? She isn’t his lawyer. He’s accused of a multibillion dollar fraud. And he was clearly a flight risk, one she personally amplified.
  - lmm 5y ago
    How would being able to meet his wife have amplified his flight risk? Indeed he said the prospect of another year being kept apart from her (while still not getting a trial or even being charged) was his reason for absconding.
  - djrogers 5y ago
    > She isn’t his lawyer. He’s accused of a multibillion dollar fraud. And he was clearly a flight risk, one she personally amplified. A) He was not in prison at the time B) Even incarcerated prisoners in most countries are allowed visits from their family C) It appears that keeping them apart is what actually amplified his flight risk, not letting them meet.
- namelessoracle 5y ago
  If you ever thought the American justice system is bad, look into the Japanese one. The whole system is designed to make you confess and apologize. They will literally lie to you and tell you it will all go away if you sign the confession paperwork. You dont get a lawyer while they do this, and they get to keep you for quite a bit of time before you get a lawyer. They also dont do trial by jury, but inquisitorial judges who you have to prove your innocence too. The judges their dont like you making them go to trial, so good luck proving your case, after all you should have confessed already. Also Japanese conditions in their detention systems makes the American system look down right palatial. The whole system is designed to punish even moreso than the American system.
anonu 5y ago
Carlos should have taken the GM role when Obama called him about it. He would've made a lot more money and not been in this situation.
- Aisen8010 5y ago
  It's very easy to say what Mr. Ghosn should have done in a retrospective analysis. Unfortunately, he didn't have a crystal ball.
- renewiltord 5y ago
  Yeah, and I should have kept all my bitcoins instead of selling them at $650 each, but here we are.
  - eyelovewe 5y ago
    Ha, I sold 2 for ~200 usd. Coulda shoulda woulda
RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
>Until then, he remains a once-big-fish in a small pond, living in exile and under armed guard in Beirut for the foreseeable future. How secure is he in Beruit? If Japan really wanted him badly, I would guess he would be pretty easy for Israeli Mossad to pick up.
- wk_end 5y ago
  It's pretty easy for Mossad to pick up whoever they want, but he's accused of white-collar crime, not matters of national security; I'd be surprised if Israel (or any other country) would be willing to deploy their intelligence services and violate another nation's sovereignty over it. Is that something they've ever done?
  - atatatat 5y ago
    Why would you hear about it...?
- yborg 5y ago
  Lebanon is an economic disaster area right now, so while this won't directly affect the fabulously wealthy Ghosn, he's ironically sort of imprisoned in a failing state.
  - emptyparadise 5y ago
    I'd take that over being in a prison cell.
  - 55555 5y ago
    He's Lebanese. It's one of his homes.
    - foogazi 5y ago
      How does this make Lebanon less of an economic disaster area?
- mschuster91 5y ago
sova 5y ago
So amazing. Haha. Wow. Very ballsy move but given the alternative outcome probably the nicest outcome possible. Serves as a nice real-world dramatic thriller of sorts. It worked. And it’ll probably be the only time this ever works. But still, a great use of that one time. I find it really interesting that Ghosn (I’m just gonna call him “Ghost,” k) was head of two other gigantic car monoliths and actually reduced Nissan’s expenditures. Given Japan’s “employed for life” culture that still pervades a great deal of companies, I wonder if that rubbed people the wrong way. Pure speculation, I don’t know what cuts were made. What I find really impressive is that he can run a car company so well that he’s recruited by other companies to take the reins for a while. Talent that can migrate among organizations and boost them all a little bit. I suppose what works at one will probably work at another. To get to that role, I wonder if he started in an executive space or rode a small car-related company up to the stratosphere and then moved laterally, or what. Complimentary joke: He is one of the quietest musical instruments around.
lkramer 5y ago
The whole story is a bit hard to untangle, but I wouldn't be surprised if both that he literally saved Nissan and funneled money off to personal projects is true. He strikes me as the type of executive who believe he can do what he wants as long as he shows result. It was rumoured that the house he lives in in Beirut actually belongs to Nissan and they've been trying to get him kicked out, but with little success.
- causality0 5y ago
  Nissan may have been saved, but it came at the cost of their reputation. According to my auto mechanic friends Nissan once ranked up there with Toyota and Honda for reliability, but their quality plummeted after the Renault deal.
  - tmh88j 5y ago
    > According to my auto mechanic friends Nissan once ranked up there with Toyota and Honda for reliability, but their quality plummeted after the Renault deal. Nissan went to crap when they took a controlling stake in JATCO and started using those god awful CVT's in everything, and then stopped putting any effort into their sports cars to keep them competitive enough to lure enthusiasts to their brand. I owned a GT-R for several years and it was a great car, but it's going on 13 years of the same generation and the 370z is hardly any different from the 350z that first came out in 2002. I could rant for hours, I used to love Nissan. I'm hoping the 400z will turn things around for them in the eyes of enthusiasts if it's priced reasonably.
    - oscb 5y ago
      Exactly this! Ghosn saved Nissan by focusing on optimizing and reducing costs and while that must've helped a lot in the short/medium term it came at a cost in the long term. It's as if Nissan had gotten stuck in the last decade of tech for cars. They went from competing with Porsche and having popular electric cars to basically being an afterthought in the market.
      - 5y ago
Simulacra 5y ago
The more I learned about the Japanese judicial system, the more I found myself cheering for this guy. The system seemed like it was designed as a can't-lose process for the prosecutors, and if arrested, you're guilty until proven innocent. I'm more sad that the guys who helped him are in hot water.
- new299 5y ago
  I’d be interested in sources on this…
  - miles 5y ago
    Not OP, but happy to oblige: Japan’s notoriously ruthless criminal justice system is getting a face lift https://qz.com/693437/japans-notoriously-ruthless-criminal-justice-system-is-getting-a-face-lift/ https://qz.com/693437/japans-notoriously-ruthless-criminal-j... A legal review of why Japan high conviction rate is bad https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/legal-review-why-japan-high-conviction-rate-bad-jacques-deguest https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/legal-review-why-japan-high-c...
    - new299 5y ago
      The first article has a couple of anecdotes, and a statement that there are reforms in progress. The second just states “little to do with the assumption that prosecutors only choose cases they are confident they can win” but doesn’t do anything to back up that claim with data. It just discusses aspects of the law that are different in Japan/the US. Would be more interesting to refute the academic work on this: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/468111 https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/468111 This article posted elsewhere also seems interesting: https://thediplomat.com/2020/03/carlos-ghosn-and-japans-99-conviction-rate/ https://thediplomat.com/2020/03/carlos-ghosn-and-japans-99-c... So, does anyone have anything a bit more detailed and systematic than the above? Also curious about treatment in Japanese prisons as compared to the US/elsewhere.
google234123 5y ago
Too bad for all the people that helped him escape who are being jailed now.
- azinman2 5y ago
  Ya exactly. What is his response to them being in jail instead of him? What a horrible thing to do to someone.
  - microtherion 5y ago
    Maybe he's working behind the scenes to free them, but in the interview, he did not seem overly concerned about their fate.
    - Google234 5y ago
      Not much he can do.
- ad404b8a372f2b9 5y ago
  I really don't understand that part to be honest, from the point of view of the two Americans. Given their part in the escape you'd think they'd be aware of Japan's terrifying justice system and of the situation with the extradition treaties. Why would you help someone escape all that if you have to go back to a country with an extradition treaty with Japan.
  - bluedevil2k 5y ago
    Money - maybe he promised them millions for their help.
    - chihuahua 5y ago
      I think they were paid about $1.3 million. To me, the amount is surprisingly low given how much money Ghosn has, and the risk and effort involved. Also I find it strange that the names of these 2 guys were known to everyone in the world immediately after Ghosn escaped.
Clewza313 5y ago
Tangentially, here's a fascinating hour-long documentary (in French, but subtitled) on what prison in Japan is like: https://youtu.be/BJp9nKaO7c4 https://youtu.be/BJp9nKaO7c4 Bear in mind that this was filmed with the cooperation of the authorities, there are plenty of stories about abuses beyond what is shown.
y-c-o-m-b 5y ago
> in a country which has a 99.4% conviction rate. Brutal. Either they're really good at building the necessary evidence or they're just ruthless when it comes to criminal justice. Based on the other comments in this thread, it seems the latter. It's interesting to me how a society that prides itself on honor can act so dishonorably when it comes to human rights. This applies to their work ethics as well. They have the most fascinating culture in my opinion, but the warts are really ugly
- new299 5y ago
  What disappoints me is that people make these claims without taking a few seconds to Google… Academic work I’ve seen suggests it’s basically down to case selection: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/468111 https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/468111 But what also fascinates me is that people can so easily come up with strong opinions about a culture based on limited information I.e saying “a society that prides itself on honor can act so dishonorably”… It’s weird, people talk about Japan like it’s an alien planet. Klingons may have been based upon the Japanese but I assure you Japanese life is not very much like Star Trek.
  - haecceity 5y ago
    We watch anime so we know what we're talking about.
  - porknubbins 5y ago
    Most popular ideas about what Japan is like by people who have never been there are probably wrong, but also Japan is massively from the US in all sorts of interesting ways that are worth talking about.
- crooked-v 5y ago
  On this note, the Ace Attorney series is one long parody of the Japanese criminal law system, which is why it's such a running theme that every defendant is automatically guilty until you incontrovertibly prove them otherwise and why the defense attorneys get treated like dirt throughout.
domains808 5y ago
Never forget the bullies and what they put Uzi Nissan through (Nissan.com), he still kept the domain. Never buy a Nissan.
laurieg 5y ago
The most curious thing: Why were none of the Japanese executives arrested? Not even briefly for questioning? Ghosn was held for hundreds of days, Kelly is currently undergoing trial. It seems to me that this was a corporate coup with assistance from the prosecutors office. The plan was Ghosn would be arrested, admit guilt straightaway, possibly under some questionable interrogation[1] and then get a fine/suspended sentence. Nissan could be free from Ghosn with a minimum of fuss. Of course, it didn't go down that way, but Ghosn fleeing the country was probably the next best thing. Public opinion in Japan generally seems to be "Why would you run if you are innocent?" and the case is forgotten. It will be interesting to see if any revelations come out in Kelly's trial (currently underway). [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/11/world/asia/11japan.html https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/11/world/asia/11japan.html
- fomine3 5y ago
  Because only Ghosn (considered to) did embezzlement?
  - 55555 5y ago
    The embezzlement charges didn't seem to make much sense when I took a look. Taken literally, sure, maybe he embezzled. But this is a guy who basically set his own salary at whatever number he wanted every year for 20 years. And apparently there was a culture at the top of the company where the executives were able to spend quite freely using company money. If you are able to simply legally pay yourself more if you want to, the only reason you wouldn't is that you are under the impression you can simply use company money for personal use anyway. What's the difference, really? It's almost just an accounting issue; clarification for investors. I read the articles a long time ago so I may be off by a bit but I recall that when I did the math Carlos Ghosn had a personal net worth of at least ~$115 million _at the time he was accused of embezzling just a few million dollars._ It's like a millionaire stealing $20,000. Certainly possible, but more likely to be some sort of misunderstanding given the circumstances. I don't expect this to be a popular comment. But the charges never made much sense to me. And normally in cases of corporate embezzlement there isn't such a compelling alternate narrative/conspiracy to explain what happened.
deleted 5y ago
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dwpdwpdwpdwpdwp 5y ago
Vanity Fair did a compelling article about this as well, which focused in more detail on the role of former green beret Michael Taylor in planning the escape. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/how-carlos-ghosn-escaped-japan https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/how-carlos-ghosn-esc...
PHGamer 5y ago
honestly i dopnt think ghosn is really the big issue anyways. as stated in the article this is more about renault than ghosn. he was just collateral, probably because he didnt wanna pick sides . probably wouldn't have been arrested if he stepped down but if you ran 2 different companies in 2 different places would you.
- Danieru 5y ago
  > probably because he didnt wanna pick sides Ghosn was pushing the merger. His plan was the headquarters the merged holding company outside both Japan and France where he would have yet even less supervision. Ghosn pillaged Nissan and Renault, and a merger was his perfect chance to cover the tracks.
  - rasz 5y ago
    Ghosn pillaged Nissan out of bankruptcy.
supernova87a 5y ago
Well, here is what I'm curious about. Which of these conditions is valid justification for violating house arrest and fleeing a jurisdiction that you are being prosecuted in? -- You believe the charges or prosecution is being unfairly conducted -- You believe you are innocent -- You believe public opinion is on your side -- You have a more favorable jurisdiction you can flee to Is it up to you to decide that you're in the right, and if you have resources, should escape the legal system? I'm sure many people feel these points when they're being prosecuted. Are they to decide? Or is it just that he's rich and had the means to act on these opinions?
- lmm 5y ago
  That's like asking when violent revolution is justified. There is certainly a point where it's legitimate, but the people undertaking it have a rather biased perspective. People at every level do what they can to evade justice systems, and of course the richer you are the more dramatic that will be. IMO it's more relevant for us to judge for ourselves whether he was right or not. Did he flee a system that we consider fair and reasonable, or one that's arbitrary and unjust?
lr1970 5y ago
All luggage is supposed to undergo a security check in an X-ray machine. This is true for private jets as well. I am curious how it played out in this particular case. Did it go through an X-ray machine or not? If yes, how did they mistook a human for a musical instrument?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- laurieg 5y ago
  The box was chosen to be too large to fit in the x-ray machine. The checks were lax for private jets. I assume this loophole is already closed.
- bogomipz 5y ago
  I'm guessing this was just a calculated risk. From last year's Vanity Fair piece: "Nothing got x-rayed, not even our backpacks”[1] I have to believe someone involved had observed similar behavior at this location prior to this escape operation. [1] https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/how-carlos-ghosn-escaped-japan https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/how-carlos-ghosn-esc...
djrogers 5y ago
>For more than a year, Mr Ghosn spent long periods in custody or was held under house arrest in Tokyo after being bailed. It was not clear when a trial would take place - the fear was it could take years - and Mr Ghosn faced a further 15 years in prison if convicted, in a country which has a 99.4% conviction rate. >It was during a period of house arrest, when Mr Ghosn was told he would not be allowed to have any contact with his wife, Carole, that he decided to find a way out. Holy cow - that's an insane system for a 'modern western democracy'...
- paulpauper 5y ago
  Not really. Federal prosecutors have a 98 percent conviction rate. Combined with long sentences means a lot of ppl just plead guilty even if innocent
- sn41 5y ago
  99.4 percent conviction rate? That sounds very suspicious to me. Btw, strange that Japan is called as 'Western' - perhaps the better term is OECD? Same goes for NZ, I guess.
  - aunty_helen 5y ago
    ???? NZ is a first world British colony, same as USA, Canada and the closest neighbour, geographically and culturally, Australia.
    - sn41 5y ago
      Yeah, but geographically it is quite east of even Japan.
      - ot 5y ago
        Or west of the US.
    - forty 5y ago
      I think parents comment is just about the fact that Japan and NZ are at the very East side of European maps, which is why it might be surprising to tag them Western.
JKCalhoun 5y ago
> From Tokyo, Mr Ghosn travelled by bullet train to Osaka where a private jet was waiting at the local airport to depart. How I escaped Japan in a private jet
csomar 5y ago
I think most people missed the most important part of the story > The large box carrying Ghosn was never x-rayed or checked by customs officials, because it was too big to fit inside the x-ray machine The security theater we have to go through in the airport is just that: a pathetic security theater. You have a large box, that's definitively something that you gotta check. If you can't x-ray it, then at least open it?
- dehrmann 5y ago
  You're conflating the role of TSA (or Japan's equivalent) with customs. The security risk of taking an uninspected box on a private jet is pretty low, and private jets routinely have fewer security checks. On the customs side, they're usually less concerned with someone smuggling something out of the country than smuggling something in. About the only thing they would have cared about leaving the country like that on a private jet is Carlos Ghosn.
  - csomar 5y ago
    I don't think you could be right. There are lots of things that could be smuggled out of a country at all times: Precious metals, precious art and historical artifacts, Money and Drugs, etc... A country does care about what is coming out of its territory. If you have a high incidence of drugs coming out of Japan, the country will be flagged by the other countries. This makes shipping both expensive and difficult. > The security risk of taking an uninspected box on a private jet is pretty low, and private jets routinely have fewer security checks. I don't have the stats, but I'd argue that on a % basis, it's less likely that a single traveler is carrying something illegal than a private jet owner. I think the reason private jet owner do not get "scanned" is their status. That would annoy these persons and Japan (and most countries) do not want to annoy them.
    - wwtrv 5y ago
      I’d assume that the likelihood that a passenger on a private jet would intend to hijack it or blow it up is rather low. Which is what the TSA cares about. Even if that happens it’s of lesser concern to the public than if it happened on a passenger jet.
touristtam 5y ago
sorry but is the BBC late to the party? I have seen articles about this as early as dec 2019. French article: https://www.lesechos.fr/amp/1159576 https://www.lesechos.fr/amp/1159576
rakoo 5y ago
I don't understand. This guy fled the justice system of a democracy, and we are telling the story as if he were the hero escaping the gulag of some authoritarian country. Why do we tell his story as if it was "good" ?
- totalZero 5y ago
  It is worth noting that he is the one telling the story here.
  - datenarsch 5y ago
    Why is he being given a platform by the BBC though

203 points by phpnode 5y ago

“ Documentary series Storyville details his extraordinary rise and sudden fall in Carlos Ghosn: The Last Flight which will be shown on BBC 4 on Wednesday 14 July.” ^ Hoping this doc will make its way to American television.. maybe PBS/Frontline?

Simulacra 5y ago
You can view BBC programing by setting up Tor to go through the U.K.
- liberalasshats 5y ago
  Thats sound advice not sure why you get downvoted, a niche vpn would probably also work, or you can can torrent it
  - jwdunne 5y ago
    Not so sound when we Brits have to pay a license fee by law for owning a TV that can tune in to any public channel just to fund the BBC!
    - _0ffh 5y ago
      Sounds downright fair in comparison to Germany, where you have to pay a TV license fee for having a home, no TV set required.
    - throwaway2037 5y ago
      As a non-British person living outside the United Kingdom, I also find it frustrating that I cannot pay to watch some things on the Beeb! (Steve McQueen - Small Axe!)
- LeoPanthera 5y ago
  I had no idea this was even possible. Can you choose the physical location of your exit nodes?

CRConrad 5y ago

How come this fucker gets to not only brag about evading justice, in stead of being rightly vilified for it, but is even given a platform to brag from by the most prestigious of media corporations?!? Why hasn't whatever country he's in -- Britain? -- clapped him in irons and extradited him the hell back to Japan? Are they even officially condoning criminals escaping justice as long as they're rich, these days? (Or is Ghosn giving interviews from some closet in the embassy of a third-world country where he's holed up, as seems traditional for fugitives on the lam in Britain nowadays?)

fotta 5y ago
> Lebanon does not have an extradition treaty with Japan so Mr Ghosn has been allowed to remain there.
- CRConrad 5y ago
  Second try, having calmed down a little: Yes, sure, he's run off to some country that has no extradition (and which conveniently for him also happens to be his native country). But still: So what -- why is this feted in international media, and not condemned? Other criminals that hare off to avoid extradition are not written up as heroes, are they? Or should they be? The only two exceptions that come to mind are a) Ronnie Biggs -- but the semi-cultish veneration this simple (and by all accounts rather bumbling) train robber received from large parts of the British public is, AIUI, now mostly (and IMO quite rightly) regarded as misguided; and b) Edward Snowden. But he blew the whistle on important wrongdoings by a superpower's military -- he did not commit any crime for personal gain. What Ghosn did was the exact opposite: cooking corporate bookkeeping, fiddling his taxes, and generally enriching himself. He is, AFAICS, just a modern-day John DeLorean, only on a much grander scale. So I still really, really just don't get it: YTF is this so widely reported on in such approving tones? He's a criminal evading justice. Surely this ought to be deplored, not revered?
- CRConrad 5y ago
  Noticed that on my second read; didn't make it all the way through on the first. Yeah, so he didn't have to go to the embassy.

sleepytimetea 5y ago

So, the justice system in Japan enforces additional restrictions after a person is out on bail ? He couldn't meet his wife seems like an unreasonable condition for someone out on bail. Also, is the justice system in Japan so backed up that he would have to wait years for it go to trial ?

JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> He couldn't meet his wife seems like an unreasonable condition for someone out on bail It’s also not ridiculous? She isn’t his lawyer. He’s accused of a multibillion dollar fraud. And he was clearly a flight risk, one she personally amplified.
- lmm 5y ago
  How would being able to meet his wife have amplified his flight risk? Indeed he said the prospect of another year being kept apart from her (while still not getting a trial or even being charged) was his reason for absconding.
- djrogers 5y ago
  > She isn’t his lawyer. He’s accused of a multibillion dollar fraud. And he was clearly a flight risk, one she personally amplified. A) He was not in prison at the time B) Even incarcerated prisoners in most countries are allowed visits from their family C) It appears that keeping them apart is what actually amplified his flight risk, not letting them meet.
namelessoracle 5y ago
If you ever thought the American justice system is bad, look into the Japanese one. The whole system is designed to make you confess and apologize. They will literally lie to you and tell you it will all go away if you sign the confession paperwork. You dont get a lawyer while they do this, and they get to keep you for quite a bit of time before you get a lawyer. They also dont do trial by jury, but inquisitorial judges who you have to prove your innocence too. The judges their dont like you making them go to trial, so good luck proving your case, after all you should have confessed already. Also Japanese conditions in their detention systems makes the American system look down right palatial. The whole system is designed to punish even moreso than the American system.

anonu 5y ago

Carlos should have taken the GM role when Obama called him about it. He would've made a lot more money and not been in this situation.

Aisen8010 5y ago
It's very easy to say what Mr. Ghosn should have done in a retrospective analysis. Unfortunately, he didn't have a crystal ball.
renewiltord 5y ago
Yeah, and I should have kept all my bitcoins instead of selling them at $650 each, but here we are.
- eyelovewe 5y ago
  Ha, I sold 2 for ~200 usd. Coulda shoulda woulda

RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago

>Until then, he remains a once-big-fish in a small pond, living in exile and under armed guard in Beirut for the foreseeable future. How secure is he in Beruit? If Japan really wanted him badly, I would guess he would be pretty easy for Israeli Mossad to pick up.

wk_end 5y ago
It's pretty easy for Mossad to pick up whoever they want, but he's accused of white-collar crime, not matters of national security; I'd be surprised if Israel (or any other country) would be willing to deploy their intelligence services and violate another nation's sovereignty over it. Is that something they've ever done?
- atatatat 5y ago
  Why would you hear about it...?
yborg 5y ago
Lebanon is an economic disaster area right now, so while this won't directly affect the fabulously wealthy Ghosn, he's ironically sort of imprisoned in a failing state.
- emptyparadise 5y ago
  I'd take that over being in a prison cell.
- 55555 5y ago
  He's Lebanese. It's one of his homes.
  - foogazi 5y ago
    How does this make Lebanon less of an economic disaster area?
mschuster91 5y ago

sova 5y ago

So amazing. Haha. Wow. Very ballsy move but given the alternative outcome probably the nicest outcome possible. Serves as a nice real-world dramatic thriller of sorts. It worked. And it’ll probably be the only time this ever works. But still, a great use of that one time. I find it really interesting that Ghosn (I’m just gonna call him “Ghost,” k) was head of two other gigantic car monoliths and actually reduced Nissan’s expenditures. Given Japan’s “employed for life” culture that still pervades a great deal of companies, I wonder if that rubbed people the wrong way. Pure speculation, I don’t know what cuts were made. What I find really impressive is that he can run a car company so well that he’s recruited by other companies to take the reins for a while. Talent that can migrate among organizations and boost them all a little bit. I suppose what works at one will probably work at another. To get to that role, I wonder if he started in an executive space or rode a small car-related company up to the stratosphere and then moved laterally, or what. Complimentary joke: He is one of the quietest musical instruments around.

lkramer 5y ago

The whole story is a bit hard to untangle, but I wouldn't be surprised if both that he literally saved Nissan and funneled money off to personal projects is true. He strikes me as the type of executive who believe he can do what he wants as long as he shows result. It was rumoured that the house he lives in in Beirut actually belongs to Nissan and they've been trying to get him kicked out, but with little success.

causality0 5y ago
Nissan may have been saved, but it came at the cost of their reputation. According to my auto mechanic friends Nissan once ranked up there with Toyota and Honda for reliability, but their quality plummeted after the Renault deal.
- tmh88j 5y ago
  > According to my auto mechanic friends Nissan once ranked up there with Toyota and Honda for reliability, but their quality plummeted after the Renault deal. Nissan went to crap when they took a controlling stake in JATCO and started using those god awful CVT's in everything, and then stopped putting any effort into their sports cars to keep them competitive enough to lure enthusiasts to their brand. I owned a GT-R for several years and it was a great car, but it's going on 13 years of the same generation and the 370z is hardly any different from the 350z that first came out in 2002. I could rant for hours, I used to love Nissan. I'm hoping the 400z will turn things around for them in the eyes of enthusiasts if it's priced reasonably.
  - oscb 5y ago
    Exactly this! Ghosn saved Nissan by focusing on optimizing and reducing costs and while that must've helped a lot in the short/medium term it came at a cost in the long term. It's as if Nissan had gotten stuck in the last decade of tech for cars. They went from competing with Porsche and having popular electric cars to basically being an afterthought in the market.
    - 5y ago

Simulacra 5y ago

The more I learned about the Japanese judicial system, the more I found myself cheering for this guy. The system seemed like it was designed as a can't-lose process for the prosecutors, and if arrested, you're guilty until proven innocent. I'm more sad that the guys who helped him are in hot water.

new299 5y ago
I’d be interested in sources on this…
- miles 5y ago
  Not OP, but happy to oblige: Japan’s notoriously ruthless criminal justice system is getting a face lift https://qz.com/693437/japans-notoriously-ruthless-criminal-justice-system-is-getting-a-face-lift/ https://qz.com/693437/japans-notoriously-ruthless-criminal-j... A legal review of why Japan high conviction rate is bad https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/legal-review-why-japan-high-conviction-rate-bad-jacques-deguest https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/legal-review-why-japan-high-c...
  - new299 5y ago
    The first article has a couple of anecdotes, and a statement that there are reforms in progress. The second just states “little to do with the assumption that prosecutors only choose cases they are confident they can win” but doesn’t do anything to back up that claim with data. It just discusses aspects of the law that are different in Japan/the US. Would be more interesting to refute the academic work on this: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/468111 https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/468111 This article posted elsewhere also seems interesting: https://thediplomat.com/2020/03/carlos-ghosn-and-japans-99-conviction-rate/ https://thediplomat.com/2020/03/carlos-ghosn-and-japans-99-c... So, does anyone have anything a bit more detailed and systematic than the above? Also curious about treatment in Japanese prisons as compared to the US/elsewhere.

google234123 5y ago

Too bad for all the people that helped him escape who are being jailed now.

azinman2 5y ago
Ya exactly. What is his response to them being in jail instead of him? What a horrible thing to do to someone.
- microtherion 5y ago
  Maybe he's working behind the scenes to free them, but in the interview, he did not seem overly concerned about their fate.
  - Google234 5y ago
    Not much he can do.
ad404b8a372f2b9 5y ago
I really don't understand that part to be honest, from the point of view of the two Americans. Given their part in the escape you'd think they'd be aware of Japan's terrifying justice system and of the situation with the extradition treaties. Why would you help someone escape all that if you have to go back to a country with an extradition treaty with Japan.
- bluedevil2k 5y ago
  Money - maybe he promised them millions for their help.
  - chihuahua 5y ago
    I think they were paid about $1.3 million. To me, the amount is surprisingly low given how much money Ghosn has, and the risk and effort involved. Also I find it strange that the names of these 2 guys were known to everyone in the world immediately after Ghosn escaped.

Clewza313 5y ago

Tangentially, here's a fascinating hour-long documentary (in French, but subtitled) on what prison in Japan is like: https://youtu.be/BJp9nKaO7c4 https://youtu.be/BJp9nKaO7c4 Bear in mind that this was filmed with the cooperation of the authorities, there are plenty of stories about abuses beyond what is shown.

y-c-o-m-b 5y ago

> in a country which has a 99.4% conviction rate. Brutal. Either they're really good at building the necessary evidence or they're just ruthless when it comes to criminal justice. Based on the other comments in this thread, it seems the latter. It's interesting to me how a society that prides itself on honor can act so dishonorably when it comes to human rights. This applies to their work ethics as well. They have the most fascinating culture in my opinion, but the warts are really ugly

new299 5y ago
What disappoints me is that people make these claims without taking a few seconds to Google… Academic work I’ve seen suggests it’s basically down to case selection: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/468111 https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/468111 But what also fascinates me is that people can so easily come up with strong opinions about a culture based on limited information I.e saying “a society that prides itself on honor can act so dishonorably”… It’s weird, people talk about Japan like it’s an alien planet. Klingons may have been based upon the Japanese but I assure you Japanese life is not very much like Star Trek.
- haecceity 5y ago
  We watch anime so we know what we're talking about.
- porknubbins 5y ago
  Most popular ideas about what Japan is like by people who have never been there are probably wrong, but also Japan is massively from the US in all sorts of interesting ways that are worth talking about.
crooked-v 5y ago
On this note, the Ace Attorney series is one long parody of the Japanese criminal law system, which is why it's such a running theme that every defendant is automatically guilty until you incontrovertibly prove them otherwise and why the defense attorneys get treated like dirt throughout.

domains808 5y ago

Never forget the bullies and what they put Uzi Nissan through (Nissan.com), he still kept the domain. Never buy a Nissan.

laurieg 5y ago

The most curious thing: Why were none of the Japanese executives arrested? Not even briefly for questioning? Ghosn was held for hundreds of days, Kelly is currently undergoing trial. It seems to me that this was a corporate coup with assistance from the prosecutors office. The plan was Ghosn would be arrested, admit guilt straightaway, possibly under some questionable interrogation[1] and then get a fine/suspended sentence. Nissan could be free from Ghosn with a minimum of fuss. Of course, it didn't go down that way, but Ghosn fleeing the country was probably the next best thing. Public opinion in Japan generally seems to be "Why would you run if you are innocent?" and the case is forgotten. It will be interesting to see if any revelations come out in Kelly's trial (currently underway). [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/11/world/asia/11japan.html https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/11/world/asia/11japan.html

fomine3 5y ago
Because only Ghosn (considered to) did embezzlement?
- 55555 5y ago
  The embezzlement charges didn't seem to make much sense when I took a look. Taken literally, sure, maybe he embezzled. But this is a guy who basically set his own salary at whatever number he wanted every year for 20 years. And apparently there was a culture at the top of the company where the executives were able to spend quite freely using company money. If you are able to simply legally pay yourself more if you want to, the only reason you wouldn't is that you are under the impression you can simply use company money for personal use anyway. What's the difference, really? It's almost just an accounting issue; clarification for investors. I read the articles a long time ago so I may be off by a bit but I recall that when I did the math Carlos Ghosn had a personal net worth of at least ~$115 million _at the time he was accused of embezzling just a few million dollars._ It's like a millionaire stealing $20,000. Certainly possible, but more likely to be some sort of misunderstanding given the circumstances. I don't expect this to be a popular comment. But the charges never made much sense to me. And normally in cases of corporate embezzlement there isn't such a compelling alternate narrative/conspiracy to explain what happened.

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dwpdwpdwpdwpdwp 5y ago

Vanity Fair did a compelling article about this as well, which focused in more detail on the role of former green beret Michael Taylor in planning the escape. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/how-carlos-ghosn-escaped-japan https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/how-carlos-ghosn-esc...

PHGamer 5y ago

honestly i dopnt think ghosn is really the big issue anyways. as stated in the article this is more about renault than ghosn. he was just collateral, probably because he didnt wanna pick sides . probably wouldn't have been arrested if he stepped down but if you ran 2 different companies in 2 different places would you.

Danieru 5y ago
> probably because he didnt wanna pick sides Ghosn was pushing the merger. His plan was the headquarters the merged holding company outside both Japan and France where he would have yet even less supervision. Ghosn pillaged Nissan and Renault, and a merger was his perfect chance to cover the tracks.
- rasz 5y ago
  Ghosn pillaged Nissan out of bankruptcy.

supernova87a 5y ago

Well, here is what I'm curious about. Which of these conditions is valid justification for violating house arrest and fleeing a jurisdiction that you are being prosecuted in? -- You believe the charges or prosecution is being unfairly conducted -- You believe you are innocent -- You believe public opinion is on your side -- You have a more favorable jurisdiction you can flee to Is it up to you to decide that you're in the right, and if you have resources, should escape the legal system? I'm sure many people feel these points when they're being prosecuted. Are they to decide? Or is it just that he's rich and had the means to act on these opinions?

lmm 5y ago
That's like asking when violent revolution is justified. There is certainly a point where it's legitimate, but the people undertaking it have a rather biased perspective. People at every level do what they can to evade justice systems, and of course the richer you are the more dramatic that will be. IMO it's more relevant for us to judge for ourselves whether he was right or not. Did he flee a system that we consider fair and reasonable, or one that's arbitrary and unjust?

lr1970 5y ago

All luggage is supposed to undergo a security check in an X-ray machine. This is true for private jets as well. I am curious how it played out in this particular case. Did it go through an X-ray machine or not? If yes, how did they mistook a human for a musical instrument?

deleted 5y ago
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laurieg 5y ago
The box was chosen to be too large to fit in the x-ray machine. The checks were lax for private jets. I assume this loophole is already closed.
bogomipz 5y ago
I'm guessing this was just a calculated risk. From last year's Vanity Fair piece: "Nothing got x-rayed, not even our backpacks”[1] I have to believe someone involved had observed similar behavior at this location prior to this escape operation. [1] https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/how-carlos-ghosn-escaped-japan https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/07/how-carlos-ghosn-esc...

djrogers 5y ago

>For more than a year, Mr Ghosn spent long periods in custody or was held under house arrest in Tokyo after being bailed. It was not clear when a trial would take place - the fear was it could take years - and Mr Ghosn faced a further 15 years in prison if convicted, in a country which has a 99.4% conviction rate. >It was during a period of house arrest, when Mr Ghosn was told he would not be allowed to have any contact with his wife, Carole, that he decided to find a way out. Holy cow - that's an insane system for a 'modern western democracy'...

paulpauper 5y ago
Not really. Federal prosecutors have a 98 percent conviction rate. Combined with long sentences means a lot of ppl just plead guilty even if innocent
sn41 5y ago
99.4 percent conviction rate? That sounds very suspicious to me. Btw, strange that Japan is called as 'Western' - perhaps the better term is OECD? Same goes for NZ, I guess.
- aunty_helen 5y ago
  ???? NZ is a first world British colony, same as USA, Canada and the closest neighbour, geographically and culturally, Australia.
  - sn41 5y ago
    Yeah, but geographically it is quite east of even Japan.
    - ot 5y ago
      Or west of the US.
  - forty 5y ago
    I think parents comment is just about the fact that Japan and NZ are at the very East side of European maps, which is why it might be surprising to tag them Western.

JKCalhoun 5y ago

> From Tokyo, Mr Ghosn travelled by bullet train to Osaka where a private jet was waiting at the local airport to depart. How I escaped Japan in a private jet

csomar 5y ago

I think most people missed the most important part of the story > The large box carrying Ghosn was never x-rayed or checked by customs officials, because it was too big to fit inside the x-ray machine The security theater we have to go through in the airport is just that: a pathetic security theater. You have a large box, that's definitively something that you gotta check. If you can't x-ray it, then at least open it?

dehrmann 5y ago
You're conflating the role of TSA (or Japan's equivalent) with customs. The security risk of taking an uninspected box on a private jet is pretty low, and private jets routinely have fewer security checks. On the customs side, they're usually less concerned with someone smuggling something out of the country than smuggling something in. About the only thing they would have cared about leaving the country like that on a private jet is Carlos Ghosn.
- csomar 5y ago
  I don't think you could be right. There are lots of things that could be smuggled out of a country at all times: Precious metals, precious art and historical artifacts, Money and Drugs, etc... A country does care about what is coming out of its territory. If you have a high incidence of drugs coming out of Japan, the country will be flagged by the other countries. This makes shipping both expensive and difficult. > The security risk of taking an uninspected box on a private jet is pretty low, and private jets routinely have fewer security checks. I don't have the stats, but I'd argue that on a % basis, it's less likely that a single traveler is carrying something illegal than a private jet owner. I think the reason private jet owner do not get "scanned" is their status. That would annoy these persons and Japan (and most countries) do not want to annoy them.
  - wwtrv 5y ago
    I’d assume that the likelihood that a passenger on a private jet would intend to hijack it or blow it up is rather low. Which is what the TSA cares about. Even if that happens it’s of lesser concern to the public than if it happened on a passenger jet.

touristtam 5y ago

sorry but is the BBC late to the party? I have seen articles about this as early as dec 2019. French article: https://www.lesechos.fr/amp/1159576 https://www.lesechos.fr/amp/1159576

rakoo 5y ago

I don't understand. This guy fled the justice system of a democracy, and we are telling the story as if he were the hero escaping the gulag of some authoritarian country. Why do we tell his story as if it was "good" ?

totalZero 5y ago
It is worth noting that he is the one telling the story here.
- datenarsch 5y ago
  Why is he being given a platform by the BBC though