Japanese man in Malaysia has his death sentence reduced to 30 years in prison

Malaysia's highest court on Wednesday commuted the death sentence handed down to a Japanese woman for drug trafficking to 30 years in prison, following a judicial reform that removed the mandatory death penalty for illicit drug trafficking and several other serious crimes.

In a unanimous decision, a three-judge panel of the Federal Court replaced the death sentence handed down to Mariko Takeuchi, 50, with a prison term of 30 years from the date of her arrest in 2009, after considered an appeal requesting a lesser sentence.

Takeuchi lost her appeal in 2015, with the court upholding a lower court's rulings in which the former nurse was sentenced to hang for trafficking 3.5 kilograms of methamphetamine to Malaysia in 2009.

She filed an appeal for a lesser sentence after a law came into force last September allowing prisoners sentenced to death or life imprisonment to request a sentence reduction. The law was part of judicial reform that abolished the death penalty or mandatory life sentence for 11 crimes, including drug trafficking, murder and terrorism.

Takeuchi told her trial she was unaware of the drugs found in a suitcase she brought to Kuala Lumpur International Airport from Dubai. She pleaded innocent, saying she carried the suitcase as a favor for an Iranian acquaintance.

Takeuchi, from Aomori Prefecture, was the first Japanese person tried for drug trafficking in Malaysia and the first sentenced to death.

His lawyer, Hisyam Teh Poh Teik, told reporters outside the courtroom that Takeuchi could be released by 2029, with prison rules allowing a one-third remission of his prison sentence for good behavior .

Before the law took effect, 1,020 convicts were on death row or serving life sentences, according to government data. Most of the convicts requested a review of their sentences after the law came into force and had their death sentences reduced to prison time.