The Kozakura Defence

60-second read

"The judges were very good-mannered as they showed no expressions on their faces. I guess they're well-trained," Serena Kozakura said.

The judges here had just been asked to consider whether Ms Kozakura's breasts were too large for her to have committed the crime.

In 2007, Ms Kozakura, a Japanese bikini model, was sentenced to 14 months in jail. She had been convicted of damage to property after a man said that she kicked in the wooden door of his room and crawled inside.

Apparently, it was because he was with another woman at the time. Ms Kozakura had said the man made the hole himself, and implied that it was an elaborate story.

Anyway, the following year, Ms Kozakura appealed.

During her appeal, her defence team kept it simple. They showed the court the size of the opening (i.e. the hole that she’s supposed to have made). They then pointed out that Ms Kozakura had a 110-centimetre (44 inches) bust. Meaning there was no way she could have squeezed through the opening.

The court agreed with her, threw out the guilty verdict, and she walked free.

Ms Kozakura later went on to say: "I used to hate my body so much. But it was my breasts that won in court”. Strange, really, that a body she hated became her defence.

After she won, a local news network brought Ms Kozakura on air, and had her demonstrate that she couldn't physically fit through an opening the size of the one in question.

In the courtroom, she’d won the case by using a standard physical-evidence argument. But outside the courtroom, it became a "her body won the case” story.

Okay, it’s a bit pantomime, but underneath the obvious comedy is a useful lesson.

The court kept a straight face. The story didn't.