A mother helps fight gun violence; Woman's son, an exchange student from Japan, was fatally shot 10 years ago in Louisiana.

photos by Lisa Malecha

Star Tribune (Minneapolis, MN)
October 5, 2002, Saturday, Metro Edition
Chuck Haga; Staff Writer

Mieko Hattori stood before hundreds of young people in the high school auditorium in Northfield on Friday and said that she had dreamed many years ago of coming from Japan to study in the United States.

She didn't make it, but her son did.

"I was very happy my son came to America," she said in soft, halting English.

Then she knelt to add her name to the many hundreds inscribed on two large banners _ names of Northfield students who have pledged to work against gun violence.

Yoshi Hattori was 16 in October 1992, an exchange student in Louisiana, when he approached the wrong house looking for a Halloween party and was shot by a man who thought he was a robber.

His death caused a sensation in Japan, where gun-control laws are strict. After she came to the United States to take her son's body home, Mieko Hattori started a petition urging action against "the gun society" in America. It held 1.7 million Japanese signatures when she presented it to President Bill Clinton in 1993.

"Everybody in Japan still knows his name," said Haruna Okumura, part of a Japanese television crew accompanying Hattori on her U.S. visit for a documentary on the 10th anniversary of Yoshi's death.

"I was in junior high school then, and I was going to high school in the United States," Okumura said. "But I thought, 'Maybe it isn't as nice there as I thought.' I didn't go until four years later, for college."

Mieko Hattori was in Baton Rouge, La., earlier this week and will visit Milwaukee, Washington, D.C., and New York before returning to Japan.

She was invited to Minnesota by Mary Lewis Grow, a Northfield resident who organized the national Student Pledge Against Violence, which since its origin in 1996 has been signed by more than 7 million American children.

"When Yoshi was killed, I felt ashamed that such a thing could happen in my country," Grow said during Friday's program. "I wanted to write letters to everyone in Japan.

"You were born into a violent world, which is not your fault," she told the students. "That's not to say you are powerless to change it. Your power resides in your ability to make responsible decisions."

There was another Northfield connection: Yoshi's host parents in Louisiana, Richard and Holley Haymaker, both graduated from Carleton College in Northfield. Their son, Webb, also attended Carleton.

Keen to dance

On Oct. 17, 1992, Yoshi and Webb were on their way to a Halloween party.

Yoshi, who studied jazz and tap dance after school, wore a white tuxedo and a ruffled shirt; he was John Travolta from "Saturday Night Fever." Webb, who had been in a car accident and wore a neck brace, added to the "accident victim" costume by bandaging his head.

They knocked at the wrong house. When nobody answered, they began to walk away, according to news accounts.

But when a man appeared at the door, Yoshi started back, smiling and waving. He may have thought the people were playing a Halloween prank, Webb said later. He may have thought the .44 magnum handgun pointed at him was a toy.

"Freeze!" the man said, but Yoshi didn't understand that use of the word and kept advancing. The man fired one shot, hitting Yoshi in the chest, and Yoshi fell to the ground. Webb ran to him. "What happened?" Yoshi asked. He died a short time later.

The man who shot Yoshi told police that he thought he was defending his home and family. He was charged with manslaughter but was found not guilty.

Some students at Friday's program said that widespread possession of handguns makes the country less safe.

"It disgusts me how guns have taken over our country," said Meredith Frederick, 16, a program organizer.

Carly Clements, 15, also participated. "It's a small thing in one small town," she said. "But maybe it will help spread the message."

The students gave Hattori 100 letters written by classmates vowing to work against gun violence. They asked her to distribute them at the high school Yoshi attended in Japan.

She also received a letter from Walter Mondale, former U.S. vice president and ambassador to Japan, which Grow read at the assembly.

"We have far to go before the scourge of gun violence goes away from our country," Mondale wrote. But he said he was heartened by the efforts of young people to change things.

_ Chuck Haga is at crhaga@startribune.com.