A San Francisco federal grand jury indicted Toguri on treason charges for her wartime broadcasts.
On October 8, 1948, a federal grand jury sitting in San Francisco, California, returned an indictment against Iva Ikuko Toguri D'Aquino on charges of treason against the United States. The indictment alleged that her wartime radio work for Radio Tokyo constituted giving aid and comfort to the enemy during a time of war — one of the gravest charges in American law, defined explicitly in the U.S. Constitution.
The indictment came after intense public and media pressure, including sensationalized reporting by American journalists who had traveled to Japan seeking to interview the "real" Tokyo Rose and who reportedly offered payment for an exclusive story, contributing to Toguri's decision to publicly identify herself with the name — a decision that would haunt her for decades.
Her indictment made her one of the only American women, and one of very few U.S. citizens overall, ever charged with treason in connection with the Pacific war. The case would proceed to trial in 1949 in San Francisco, becoming a major national spectacle. Decades later, investigative journalism would reveal that key witnesses against her had been coached by prosecutors and threatened with their own prosecution, casting serious doubt on the fairness of the proceedings that flowed from this indictment.