Death Row Guru's Sins Stain Family

File under: Gurus Doin' Time

The woes of the children of Shoko Asahara are many. Denied admission to schools, jobs and a place to live with few friends to speak of, Asahara's pair of twenty-something daughters and his tween son are enduring the harsh fate of a death row family in Japan:

Human rights specialists say the Aum family case is not unusual. "While Aum is responsible for terrible crimes, there are also many others who live in shame, suffer depression and even commit suicide because they cannot face the social ostracism in Japan after they are identified to be related to a criminal, especially when the crime involves the death sentence..."

It all sounds a bit unfair to us. Sure the guy was completely evil, but that doesn't mean his kids are. It must be a Japanese thing.

We suppose it's their karma to endure this fate as one more dimension of the tragedy wrought by their father's murder spree. We recommend that they just come to the States. With an agent and the correct approach, they could easily work their familial ties into a ton of street cred... and perhaps even a movie deal or two.