The Kyoto District Public Prosecutors Office on Thursday appealed against the acquittal of a man charged with murdering the president of Ohsho Food Service in a 2013 shooting.

The prosecutors argued at trial that defendant Yukio Tanaka, 60, was the gunman, saying that his DNA profile matched that from saliva found on two cigarette butts collected near the crime scene. They sought life imprisonment.

Tanaka pleaded not guilty, denying the charges.

In its Oct. 16 ruling, Kyoto District Court found that reasonable doubt remained over whether Tanaka was the shooter, saying that the cigarette butts could have been left by a third party. It rejected the prosecutors’ arguments.

Tanaka was indicted for shooting then-Ohsho Food Service President Takayuki Ohigashi, 72, in the chest and abdomen with a handgun in a parking lot in front of the company’s headquarters in Kyoto’s Yamashina Ward early on Dec. 19, 2013.…