Fukuoka Prefectural Police open and look through the "suspect notebooks" that arrested and detained people use to record what happens during interrogations, according to 読売新聞. The paper reports that officers carry out the check every day as part of a property inspection at police detention facilities.
The practice sets Fukuoka apart from its neighbours. When 読売新聞 asked the nine prefectural police forces across Kyushu, Yamaguchi and Okinawa how they handle such notebooks, the eight outside Fukuoka said they do not treat the contents as something to be inspected as a matter of course.
Why it matters
The notebook is one of the few places a detained person can keep a written account of questioning and of their contact with a lawyer. Japanese courts have repeatedly examined when police may look inside one, and they have not spoken with a single voice.
A 2020 ruling by the Nagoya District Court found that inspecting the contents is unlawful unless there is a high degree of necessity, such as preserving order and discipline inside a detention facility. The court ordered compensation after finding that officers had breached a legal duty in the course of their work. The Nagoya High Court reached the same conclusion, and the decision became final.
The Yokohama District Court took a similar line in 2023 in a case involving Kanagawa Prefectural Police. It warned that if detainees believe officers may read what they write, they could be discouraged from writing at all. Inspection should in principle be limited to what can be seen from the outside, the court said, and checking the contents without special circumstances is unlawful. It found that the right to meet and communicate privately with a lawyer had been infringed.
Not every court has agreed. The Sapporo District Court ruled in 2024 that a Hokkaido officer's inspection, in which a notebook was flipped through for several tens of seconds, was not unlawful. The court reasoned that the check most naturally amounted to looking for hidden dangerous objects and for notes about the layout of the facility, and that it could not be accepted that the specific contents had been examined.
How the check works in Fukuoka
According to Fukuoka Prefectural Police, staff at police station detention facilities inspect the cells, including detainees' belongings, when shifts change and the duty roster turns over. During that check, an officer opens the notebook in front of the suspect and looks for several things: sketches of the facility, instructions to destroy evidence, or the names of detention officers. Officers also check whether pages have been torn out or dangerous items slipped between them.
The force says the purpose is to prevent suicides and escapes. It describes the inspection as a check for anything in the writing that could compromise security, carried out by glancing through the pages for a short time, and says officers are instructed not to look at material connected to interrogation. On that basis the force considers its handling appropriate.
Other forces take a different approach. Some do check notebooks for concealed dangerous objects, but in Saga and Okinawa, among others, the suspect is asked to hold the notebook and point it downwards, according to 読売新聞. Kagoshima Prefectural Police, which follows that method, said it does not confirm contents because doing so would protect the right to meet a lawyer without a witness present.
One senior officer at a Kyushu prefectural police force told the paper that the Fukuoka approach "would not happen here."
The National Police Agency, asked about the practice, described the notebook as an item closely tied to a suspect's rights. It said that while opening a notebook to check it could be envisaged where there is a high degree of necessity, inspecting the contents is not normally contemplated, and that it will push for more appropriate handling.
A wider dispute over notebook storage
The contents check is not the only point of friction. Police forces nationwide keep suspect notebooks outside the cell at night while detainees sleep, a measure intended to prevent suicides and accidents such as swallowing torn pages. Since last November, bar associations in Kumamoto and Saga and the Kyushu Federation of Bar Associations have argued that this practice risks undermining the right to meet and communicate privately with a lawyer, and have called for it to be changed.
Tsujimoto Norihisa, a professor of criminal procedure at Kindai University, told 読売新聞 that even a quick flip-through is a response that treats the right to confidential access to counsel lightly. Notebooks are in principle shared only with a defence lawyer, he said, and it is hard to imagine that what is written in them would lead to a concrete danger such as an escape. He added that it is not acceptable for police practice to differ from region to region.
Watch whether the National Police Agency issues concrete guidance to prefectural forces on how notebooks may be handled, and whether the bar associations' requests on overnight storage produce any change in practice.
