A 60-year-old Japanese lorry driver living in poverty decided to sue a hospital after discovering he was accidentally switched at birth back in 1953.
John (pseudonym) was reportedly born just 13 minutes before the baby he was swapped with, which led to him being raised by the wrong family.
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His biological family was well-off
Since then, John lived a tough life in a household with no electrical appliances and had to work part-time while struggling to finish secondary school, as reported by the South China Morning Post.
Meanwhile, the other baby, Eric (pseudonym), grew up well-educated and went on to become a company boss, with his three younger brothers also holding high positions in business.
Old family photos of the lorry driver
The truth only came to light six decades later when the wealthy family’s younger sons became unhappy with how Eric was treating their father.
After their mother passed away, Eric reportedly kept their father’s share of her inheritance in exchange for taking care of him, but instead sent him to a nursing home.
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The hospital was ordered to pay over ~RM1 million in compensation
The younger sons eventually noticed that their older brother didn’t quite look like them and remembered their late mother once mentioning that his clothes had changed after a nurse gave him a bath at the hospital.
In 2009, they decided to send a cigarette butt discarded by Eric for a DNA test, which revealed that he wasn’t biologically related to them. They later managed to track down John, but by the time he learned about his real parents, both had already passed away.
Decades-old hospital records eventually uncovered the lorry driver’s true identity
In November 2013, a court in Tokyo’s Sumida district ordered the hospital to pay John JPY 38 million (~RM1,047,106) for mistakenly switching him with another baby right after birth.
Judge Masatoshi Miyasaka said John deserved compensation as he “should have been raised in a financially comfortable environment.”
“He was separated from his biological parents almost immediately after birth and will never get the chance to meet them,” the judge said.
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Also read: Mother Shocked After Realising Her Baby Was Switched At Birth In Shah Alam Private Hospital
