Upholding lower court rulings, Japan’s Supreme Court has ordered advertising giant Dentsu Group to pay a fine of ¥300 million over bid-rigging related to the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics in 2021.

The top court also backed lower court rulings that sentenced Koji Henmi, 58, former assistant chief of the sports department of Dentsu, the group’s core subsidiary, to two years in prison, suspended for four years.

The Supreme Court made the decisions Tuesday, with its First Petty Bench dismissing the appeals by Dentsu Group and Henmi, both charged with violating the antimonopoly law.

According to the lower court rulings, Henmi conspired with a former senior official of the Tokyo Games organizing committee and others in February-July 2018 to preselect the winners of the organizer’s contracts for planning Tokyo Games test events and for the operations of the Olympics and Paralympics.

In its ruling issued in January this year, Tokyo District Court said that Dentsu Group cannot escape criticism for blocking competition as it is the leading player in the domestic advertising industry and therefore was in a position in which it could exert influence on activities of rival companies.

Tokyo High Court upheld the district court ruling in July, turning down the defendants’ appeals.

Over the high-profile bid-rigging case, six companies and six individuals, one each from the firms, were indicted. Of them, four companies and four people, including Dentsu Group and Henmi, received guilty rulings. The other two firms and two individuals are waiting for their district court rulings.

A guilty verdict for the former Tokyo Games organizing committee official, 58, has been finalized.