Tokyo Court Upholds Suspended Sentence for Former Nissan Executive Greg Kelly

A Tokyo court on Tuesday upheld a six-month suspended sentence for former Nissan executive Greg Kelly, who was accused of aiding the company’s former CEO, Carlos Ghosn, in concealing income.

Both Kelly, a 68-year-old American, and the prosecutors had appealed the 2022 verdict, but the Tokyo High Court dismissed both appeals.

Kelly was arrested in 2018 in Japan alongside Ghosn, whose arrest and subsequent escape made headlines worldwide. Ghosn, a French, Lebanese, and Brazilian national, fled Japan in 2019 while on bail, hiding in a music equipment case. Kelly remained in Japan to face charges.

After the initial verdict nearly three years ago, Kelly returned to the United States and did not attend the subsequent hearings at the higher court.

His lawyer, Yoichi Kitamura, confirmed that Kelly would appeal to Japan’s Supreme Court, despite the High Court’s ruling.

Kitamura expressed confusion over why the appeal was rejected, adding that the prosecutors had originally sought a two-year prison sentence for Kelly, accusing him of helping Ghosn under-report his income by 9.1 billion yen (approximately $60 million).

However, Kelly was found not guilty for the years 2010 to 2016 but was convicted for the financial year 2017, receiving a suspended prison sentence for three years.

Ghosn’s dramatic escape to Lebanon, where he remains at large, embarrassed Japanese authorities. Ghosn claims that he fled Japan out of fear that he would not receive a fair trial.

In a separate development, French investigators have issued an international arrest warrant for Ghosn over allegations of misuse of company funds and money laundering connected to contracts involving a Renault-Nissan subsidiary.

Meanwhile, Honda and Nissan are reportedly in talks to explore a potential merger, which Ghosn described as a sign that Nissan was in “panic mode.”