Book on Ghosn case to be suspended

A Japanese lawyer who had been interviewing former Nissan Chairman Carlos Ghosn says prosecutors have underestimated how easy it would be to build a case against him.Charges against Ghosn allege he under-reported his promised compensation in documents and breached trust in making dubious payments.

Nobuo Gohara, said he believes Japanese authorities had a "lax view" when building the case against Ghosn.Speaking to a news conference in Tokyo on Wednesday he said: "I believe, they felt that it was going to be much easier to arrest Mr. Ghosn under the alleged violation of financial instrument act and obtain their admission from both Mr. Ghosn and Mr. Kelly and have them leave the country."

"I think that was their lax view on things but what happened was beyond their initial expectations and there were forced to bring the special breach of trust case," he said.

Gohara says he was secretly interviewing Ghosn for a book project that objectively reviews this case.A total of more than 10 hours was spent on these interviews before Ghosn's escape out of Japan.Gohara said he did not know about his plans to skip bail to fly to Lebanon and was shocked and surprised by the news.

The book that was planned for publication in April 2020, but has now been suspended until further notice due to the publication's internal reasons."This has nothing to do, in my mind, with the illegal departure," Gohara said.On 13 January this year, Gohara had a video conference call with Ghosn and was given permission to share some details of their meetings.

Gohara had met with Ghosn a total of five times since mid-November last year.Gohara says although it would've been a long battle, maybe even taking up to 10 years in total during which Ghosn will be detained in Japan, he had a chance of being acquitted.

(Image Credit:AP)