The father of Lucie Blackman, the British bar hostess whose dismembered body was found in Japan seven years ago, has hit out at his ex-wife’s accusations that he accepted “blood money” from the man accused of killing her.

Tim Blackman, who is in Tokyo for tomorrow’s verdict in the trial of Joji Obara, denied claims by Lucie’s mother, Jane Steare, that he perpetrated a fraud by signing documents questioning the evidence against him in return for one million yen (£420,000) “condolence money”.

“Any prospect that it was fraudulent in some way is completely and utterly ludicrous,” Mr Blackman said. “I find [the accusation] absolutely, entirely inappropriate. This is a really important time in Lucie's case and there could have been any time in the last eight or nine months when she could raise these issues. But to do it on the eve of Lucie's hearing just is inexcusable.”

In an interview with the Daily Mail, Mrs Steare, who divorced Mr Blackman before the disappearance of their daughter, said: “As far as I am concerned, Tim accepted 100 million pieces of silver. Judas was content with just 30. It's bad enough losing your daughter in the terrible circumstances that Lucie died. But to then find out that her father seems to have colluded with the defence team has been emotionally crippling.”

Over the weekend, The Sunday Times reported that Hampshire police are investigating the suggestion that Mr Blackman was “fraudulent” in accepting the money from Mr Obara because he signed a document saying that he was “representing” the family of Lucie. But no charges have so far been brought, and it is not clear against whom the alleged fraud was perpetrated.

Mr Obara’s lawyers offered money to Mrs Steare as well as to the parents of Carita Ridgway, an Australian woman whom he is also alleged to have killed in 1992. Apart from Mr Blackman, all refused, although several of the eight women whom he is alleged to have raped also accepted smaller payments.

Japanese courts sometime stake into account cash payments to victims in sentencing defendants who have pleased guilty and seek to atone for their crimes. But Mr Obara has refused to accept any criminal responsibility and even some of his own lawyers doubt that the payments will help to reduce his sentence.

Tomorrow’s verdict in the Tokyo District Court brings to an end a six and half year trial unprecedented in Japanese legal history which has tested the limits of the country’s justice system. Most Japanese defendants meekly confess their crimes; partly as a result the country’s conviction rate for violent crime is more than 99 per cent.

Statistically, therefore, Mr Obara’s chances of acquittal appear to be almost non-existent. But he has fought a stubborn battle against seemingly overwhelming evidence, aided by a large and constantly changing team of defence lawyers, private detectives, web site designers and ghost writers, and the fortune his family inherited from his late father.

This morning, Mr Blackman and his daughter Sophie visited the seaside cave where Lucie’s dismembered body was found six years ago, seven months after she abruptly disappeared while working as a bar hostess sin a Tokyo nightclub. “We are reaching a final point,” he said. “To come here for the last time, knowing it to be the last time, is a very important thing to do.”

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