Korean Police Dismiss Misinformation They Were Short Handed During Itaewon Stampede Due to Presidential Security
The misinformation going around that the Yongsan police department was short handed due to providing presidential security quickly spread around the Internet after the Itaewon stampede tragedy. Now the police are trying to play catch up to get the truth out that they actually had more officers in Itaewon than past Halloween celebrations:
Halloween festivities in Itaewon have no official organizers. South Korean police said Monday they don’t have any specific procedures for handling incidents such as crowd surges during an event that has no organizers.
Police said they dispatched 137 officers to maintain order during Halloween festivities on Saturday, much more than the 34-90 officers mobilized in 2017, 2018 and 2019 before the pandemic.
Citing those figures, police dismissed as “different from the truth” speculation that a police station in the area was understaffed because it was providing extra security for Yoon, who earlier moved the presidential office to a site near Itaewon. They said police-provided security for presidents has long been handled by two special police units which have nothing to do with the Yongsan police station, whose jurisdiction includes Itaewon.
ABC News
You can read more at the link, but the misinformation being put out was clearly an attempt to politicize the tragedy and blame it on President Yoon. If it got traction then it could help set up Yoon for impeachment much like what happened to former President Park Geun-hye who got blamed for the Sewol disaster during her presidency.
Thanks for reporting that, GI.
If it’s not a question of police quantity, is it a question of police quality?
Quality of training, quality of management, quality of scenario planning?
Korean prosecutors and the KNPA have always had an uneasy relationship.
Will Yoon task his former prosecutor colleagues with “restructuring” KNPA management, training and recruitment?
It may be a case of nuking and repaving a lot of unions.
of course the commies are lying.
GI Korea desperately trying to protect a US stooge. Care to explain then why there were only 50+ policemen on duty at the scene? Come on, I want to hear your excuses for Yoon. Of course his ass needs to be impeached and thrown into jail. That would mean a big loss for US business interests.
Sorry, commie…
…only allowed one coup per 30 years.
Commenters at Naver say there were twice as many people in 2017 and police did not block off that alley, nor were they directing traffic near there. I assume most people are able to negotiate space and movement even in that legion of humanity. A few things went catastrophically wrong for that bottleneck to occur. Apparently some miscreants started pushing behind that alley.
Police don’t “control crowds”, they can block certain areas and issue orders and direct traffic. Cops can’t stop someone in that alley from yelling “allah Akbur” to create a panic, and ambulances can’t simply leapfrog over masses of people to come to their aid.
They could have limited the crowd size, but that would require logistical planning days before the event. Checkpoints, road blockades, detours, etc. Needlessly to say it would be a terrible inconvenience to residents and business.
Hindsight is always 20/20, as they say. America did not dispatch 700 policeman to stop rioters from burning down cities, so this idea that a legion of police fit for presidential security should have descended upon Itaewon to stop an unforeseeable tragedy is a bit of a stretch.