A Japanese governor was ordered Wednesday by a court to pay back 20.9 million yen ($141,700) that a local government had spent on purchasing one of Toyota Motor Corp.'s most luxurious sedans.
The court said the Yamaguchi prefectural government could have chosen a cheaper model given its budgetary constraints, concluding it misused taxpayers' money when it bought the Century sedan in 2020.
It also found that Yamaguchi Gov. Tsugumasa Muraoka failed to perform the duty of directing and supervising prefectural officials, which could have prevented them from making an illegal decision.
The Yamaguchi District Court ruled that the prefectural government's procedures around the decision to buy the Century, which it had claimed was intended for use as transport for imperial family members and foreign guests, was "inadequate."
It also emphasized that the Imperial Household Agency had never made requests to any prefectural government in the country for a specific car model for such purposes.
Presiding Judge Noriyuki Yamaguchi said that the entire amount paid for the purchase must be reimbursed to the prefectural government.
The damages lawsuit was filed by Shunji Matsubayashi, 75, a former prefectural government official. His lawyer said that this kind of ruling recognizing the illegality of a public vehicle purchase is very uncommon in Japan.
The prefectural government already had three models of the Century, and had traded in two of them to buy a new one in 2020. Those models were thought to be ageing and the trade-in was part of its cost-cutting efforts, as it had expected to have a deficit of 27.6 billion yen in its initial budget for fiscal 2020.
The 20.9 million yen is said to be the second-most expensive official vehicle in Japan after one owned by the Tokushima prefectural government.
