TOKYO: A Japanese court on Friday sentenced a former US airman to 18 years in prison for murdering his divorced Japanese wife and burning her body in a car boot.

The Aomori District Court said William Scott Omari McAllister, 26, strangled his former wife Naomi Kimura to death in northern Aomori prefecture in July 2006.

McAllister then dumped the body of Kimura, then 33, in a car boot and set the vehicle on fire.

Judge Hidetaka Watanabe said McAllister was “nearsighted and self-centered.” McAllister killed the victim “relentlessly,” he said, adding, “His criminal conduct was cruel and atrocious.” Japan has been officially pacifist since World War II and hosts more than 40,000 troops from the United States, which is bound by treaty to defend its Asian ally.

But past crimes have strained relations with local communities. In June 2006, a Japanese court sentenced a US sailor to life in prison for robbing and murdering a local woman.—AFP