Kyoto University Law Student Busted for Pot

[MsRedEye]

OSAKA (Kyodo) Adding to the recent spate of students at the nation's top universities getting into trouble over marijuana, a Kyoto University law school student has been arrested after allegedly walking into a police station with some pot in one of his pockets, police said Sunday.

Masataka Taniguchi, a 20-year-old sophomore in the Faculty of Law, was arrested Saturday at the police station in Osaka's Minami entertainment district.

He and four other people went to the station to resolve trouble between Taniguchi and a woman at a nearby nightclub. Officers searched Taniguchi's belongings due to his behavior while being questioned about the incident.

Taniguchi told the officers he got the marijuana from an acquaintance in the nightclub a few hours earlier. A wooden pipe apparently for smoking the drug was allegedly found in the same pocket in his trousers.

Kyoto University, one of the nine Imperial universities founded in the late 19th century and early 20th century in a national project to raise Japan's international standing, is widely considered the country's No. 2 academic institution, ranked only behind the University of Tokyo.

Two students at Keio University in Tokyo were taken into custody in October for dealing marijuana on campus. They have received suspended prison terms.

It was revealed in November that a student at Tokyo's Waseda University had been arrested for growing marijuana in his condominium while two other Waseda students were caught trying to smuggle pot from the Netherlands.

Fourteen students at Hosei University in Tokyo have been punished for smoking pot. A student at Kansai University in Osaka Prefecture was sentenced to 38 months for dealing on campus and five students of Doshisha University in Kyoto have been suspended or expelled over pot.


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Source: The Japan Times
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