Sept. 19 (UPI) -- A Japanese court on Thursday acquitted three former Tokyo Electric Power Co. executives on charges of professional negligence in connection to the 2011 Fukushima meltdown, ending the only criminal trial to come from the nuclear power plant disaster.
The Tokyo District Court ruled that the three former TEPCO executives -- Tsunehisa Katsumata, 79, Ichiro Takekuro, 73, and Sakae Muto, 69 -- were not responsible for the deaths of 44 people who died during or after mandatory evacuations of a local hospital due to the nuclear crisis, Japan Today reported.