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by hannyaharamita 1420 days ago
A popular narrative is that the choice is between Ghosn being guilty or a victim of a Nissan management coup d'etat.

This is a false dichotomy, it is also quite possible that illicit activity by Ghosn provided convenient ammunition to people with incentive to have him removed.

People pushing the binary narrative focus on how the Japanese prosecution seems over the top for what is essentially a financial reporting law violation. However, the reporting issues are only two of the allegations.

The other two seem more serious, breach of trust in getting Nissan to cover collateral for FX losses, and misappropriation of funds in which $15 million was sent to a Nissan dealership, a portion of which was then transferred to a company controlled by Ghosn.

Adding to these the French arrest warrant on charges of money laundering and abuse of company assets, which seem to include misuse of company funds to allegedly pay for a lavish personal party at Versailles, one must wonder if online Ghosn supporters are organic or reputation management staff.

3 comments

It’s also largely fuelled by the negative experiences many foreigners, resident or tourist, have had with the Japanese police.

O: https://www.reddit.com/r/japanlife/comments/j4ccy4/how_being...

1: https://www.reddit.com/r/japanlife/comments/tcxseo/arrested_...

I tend to believe Ghosn here. He is definitely not a saint, but I don’t think he would have gotten a fair trial.
A professional video of the Versaille Ghosn's birthday payed by Renault-Nissan party was interestingly published on youtube.

The video is now private (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYhWZ0IYFSg) but for some reasons I have a backup of the video. This link is a fair re-upload: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4Fz9ThQvH4

This is hilarious. All the money in the word and rich peoples’ best parties are worse than practically every 20 year old’s in their parents suburban house.
Asiatimes.com had a 4 part series on Ghosn. BusinessInsider as well iirc did a piece on him. Both are damning of Nissan and Japanese legal system. A related story also not broadcast loudly is that of an American lawyer that also got a taste of Japanese jails.

Ghosn is very credible here, if unlike WSJ, you wish to consider the facts. "[I]t is quite possible" is not factual matter.

This story involves industrial policy and interests of at least two major powers: France and Japan. In that scale of matters, Ghosn is a little guy. Good for him for escaping what sounds like hell.

https://asiatimes.com/2022/04/ghosn-shares-damning-new-docum...

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/04/business/michael-taylor-c...

Sorry for offtopicness - could you please email me at hn@ycombinator.com?
Rather not associate pii with my hn account. Anything urgent?
Nothing urgent! I wanted to email you a repost invite.