Zushi, a popular beach near Yokosuka Naval Base, Japan, is pictured on March 22, 2024. (Akifumi Ishikawa/Stars and Strip)
YOKOSUKA, Japan — The U.S. sailor accused of running into and injuring several people near a popular Japanese beach in 2022 was found guilty on all counts Friday but avoids jail time with a suspended sentence.
Petty Officer 2nd Class Daniel Krieger, 31, a logistics specialist aboard the guided-missile destroyer USS Milius, was sentenced to two years and four months of prison with hard labor, suspended for four years by the Yokohama District Court Yokosuka Branch.
Krieger hasn’t decided whether he will appeal the sentence, lead defense attorney Takashi Takano told Stars and Stripes after the sentencing.
“I think the decision was wrong,” Takano told reporters after the hearing.
At a prior hearing, Krieger admitted to charging into five people and knocking them down near Zushi Beach on July 9, 2022.
However, he pleaded not guilty on March 8 to four counts of bodily injury. His attorneys argued that he suffers from a pre-existing brain injury and was severely intoxicated at the time of the incident.
All five people were injured, the most severely a man, 33 at the time, with multiple sprained vertebrae and a woman, 58, with a broken upper jaw, broken nasal bone and other facial injuries.
The woman, now 60, said she was happy with the verdict, but disappointed by the suspended sentence.
“I hope he recognizes his crime after this decision, because he hasn’t apologized or shown any remorse,” she told reporters after the sentencing. She declined to provide her name.
In a summary, the three-judge panel led by Judge Yasushi Katada said they noted the two most injured parties required two months of medical treatment or recovery, and the remaining two required between one and two weeks.
Prosecutors ultimately indicted Krieger on four counts of causing bodily injury.
Krieger’s wife, Rina Krieger, testified April 25 that the sailor had consumed at least 11 alcoholic beverages over the course of several hours that day.
She said her husband struggles with memory lapses and has problems with balance, the result of a 2015 brain injury he suffered while breaking up a fight.
The judges said Krieger’s health and intoxication played a part in the case, but they didn’t believe it excused his actions or absolved him of responsibility.
The incident, during which Krieger kicked one of the injured parties, constituted “dangerous brutality,” according to the summary. They also described it as “indiscriminate violence committed in public against people who were not at fault.”
Katada in the summary said the judges felt Krieger was unable to control himself because he was drunk and his actions were a way to “relieve his stress” about the overall situation and his ongoing health issues.
The judges found Krieger intentionally injured the 33-year-old man and a second man, and by negligence injured the other two people, Katada told the court.
Japanese police interviewed Krieger after the incident; afterward he was restricted to the naval base throughout the trial.
Krieger testified that he consumed between 10 and 20 drinks that day and remembers very little of the incident.
“It was like a dream, when a monster chases you, but you don’t know why,” he said.
Krieger also faces a civil lawsuit, with the injured parties asking for about $153,000.
