Driving a car while looking at a smartphone A man was sentenced to 3 years in prison on August 7 at 17:24

Last year, a man sentenced to 3 years in prison was sentenced to a man who was charged with driving a car on a highway while watching cartoons on his smartphone and killing a motorcycle woman.

Former truck driver in Joetsu City, Niigata Prefecture, defendant Shimoyama Kodo (51) was driving a car at a speed of 100 km / h while watching a cartoon on a smartphone on the Kanetsu Expressway, and Yuriko Iguchi (at that time) 39) is accused of lethal driving and lethal.

In the previous trials, the prosecution demanded four years in prison as “the responsibility to select a dangerous act from the easy feeling that I want to read the next story as soon as possible” was imprisoned. "We have consistently acknowledged the facts," he called for a sentence with probation.

In a ruling on the 7th, Judge Kohei Iwata of the Nagaoka branch of the Niigata District Court said, “Driving concentrated on a smartphone for quite a long time is likely to be directly connected to a serious accident, and it is especially dangerous that it is not a momentary carelessness. It ’s a bad thing. ”

He then sentenced him to a three-year prison sentence saying that the victim had no fault and was suddenly deprived of his life.

Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance develops driving prevention application

Non-life insurance giant “Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance” is developing an app to prevent “while driving” on smartphones.

In this application, the location of the driver's smartphone is identified by radio waves transmitted from the device mounted on the car, the application starts automatically when driving over 20 km, and calls and application operations can not be done until the engine is turned off about it.

The company is developing for companies with carriers and commercial vehicles, and the administrator can check the activation status of the driver's app on a dedicated website.

The company has decided to start the app service after October.

Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Co., Ltd. Assistant Manager Shinichiro Ogawa said, “We started development in response to a voice from the company that employees wanted to eliminate driving while driving. We wanted to eliminate accidents while driving. If the company that introduced the system has a deterrent effect, I would like to use it to reduce insurance premiums. "