Japan’s top court has thrown out an appeal by a former doomsday cult member sentenced to life for murder in a sarin attack in 1994.

A former doomsday cult member has been sentenced to death by the Tokyo High Court today for a 1995 nerve gas attack on Tokyo’s subways, overturning a lower court ruling condemning him to life in prison.

The doomsday cult behind the 1995 deadly gassing on the Tokyo subway is growing steadily and reasserting influence through the Internet, the Japanese government said today.