Takuma Nishimura Early military career . Nishimura was a graduate of the 22nd class of the Imperial Japanese Army Academy in 1910 , and subsequently attended Army Engineering School . He graduated from the 32nd class of the Army Staff College in 1920 . He served most of his career in various staff and administrative posts within the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff . Nishimura served as presiding judge at the court - martial of army officers responsible for the assassination of Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi in 1932 . The defendants all received light sentences . For this he was apparently rewarded later with command of the Imperial Guards Division , a prestigious post . From 1936 - 1938 , Nishimura was commander of the 9th Infantry Regiment , and from 1938 - 1939 commanded the 1st Heavy Field Artillery Brigade . He became Chief of Staff of the Eastern Defense Army from 1939 - 1940 . Promoted to Major General in 1940 , Nishimura was commander of the Indochina Expeditionary Army in the invasion of French Indochina in 1940 . Nishimura was promoted to Lieutenant General in 1941 . World War II . During 1941 , Nishimura commanded the 21st Independent Mixed Brigade , and then the Imperial Guard Division during the Malayan campaign . During the Battle of Muar , the Imperial Guards killed 155 Australian and Indian prisoners of war , in an event known as the Parit Sulong Massacre . Following the surrender of Allied forces in Singapore , Nishimura was in charge of the eastern half of Singapore Island , during the period in which the Sook Ching massacre took place . Nishimura himself was often at odds with the commander of the 25th Army , General Tomoyuki Yamashita , at times engaging in conduct that seemed deliberately insulting . As a result , his division was denied the Emperor ' s Victory Citation , and he was recalled to Japan and forced to retire in April 1942 . From June 1943 - February 1944 , Nishimura was appointed governor of the Shan States in northern Burma . From February 1944 , Nishimura was appointed Japanese military Governor of Sumatra , a post he held until the end of the war . Trials for war crimes . After the end of the war , Nishimura was tried by a British military tribunal in Singapore for the events related to the Sook Ching massacre . He was found guilty of war crimes , and was sentenced to life imprisonment , of which he served four years in Singapore before being sent back to Tokyo to complete his sentence . As he was being repatriated to Japan , Nishimura was forcibly removed from a ship at Hong Kong by Australian military police and brought before an Australian military tribunal on Manus Island , where he was charged with events on connection to the Parit Sulong massacre . Evidence was presented stating that Nishimura had ordered the shootings at Parit Sulong and the destruction of bodies . Nishimura was found guilty and was executed by hanging on 11 June 1951 . In 1996 , Australian journalist Ian Ward suggested that the Australian Army prosecutor , Captain James Godwin — a former Royal New Zealand Navy pilot who had been ill - treated as a POW in Sumatra — had " manipulated " evidence to implicate Nishimura . Ward ' s impressions were prompted by fabricated evidence from a U . S . lobbyist seeking compensation for Japanese POWs . Ward also claimed that Godwin took no action on the testimony of Lieutenant Fujita Seizaburo , who reportedly stated that he was responsible for the Parit Sulong massacre . Fujita was not charged and his fate is unknown . But later in the 1990s , it was revealed that Ian Ward ' s accusation towards Godwin was part of political propaganda at the time .