Category: crime & punishment

It appears the Vice Justice Minister was given some special treatment by the Korean police:

The National Police Agency issued an apology Monday for misleading the public about the existence of footage capturing Vice Justice Minister Lee Yong-gu allegedly assaulting a taxi driver in November.  

Choi Seung-ryul, acting chief of the police’s newly formed National Investigation Headquarters (NIH), admitted his earlier briefing on Dec. 28 last year suggesting there was no dashboard camera footage of the incident was “partly incorrect.”  

Lee, who was appointed the No. 2 figure at the Justice Ministry in December, has been in the hot seat after opposition politicians claimed police may have let him off the hook for the incident.  

According to police, Lee took a taxi to his home in Seocho-dong in Seocho District, southern Seoul, on Nov. 6. He fell asleep in the car, and the driver woke him up when they reached the destination. Lee allegedly hurled insults at the driver and grabbed him by the collar.  

The driver called the police to report an assault, and a unit went to the scene and took his statement.  

The taxi driver reached a settlement with Lee the next day and informed the police that he did not want to press criminal charges. The police closed the case without a criminal investigation.  

But controversy flared up again after media reports surfaced there was in fact footage from the taxi, and that the taxi driver had shown the video in question to a police officer through his mobile phone in a police investigation on Nov. 11.  

The taxi driver claimed the officer watched the approximately 30-second-long video, then said he was going to “pretend [he] never saw” the footage. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but this appears to be another one of those incidents where the cover up was worse than the crime.

Here is yet another example of someone from the South Korean political left sexually assaulting someone. This time it is a party chairman sexually assaulting a lawmaker:

Justice Party Chairman Kim Jong-cheol stepped down after admitting to sexually assaulting one of the party’s lawmakers.    
   
“I am here to announce very humiliating, devastating news that Chairman Kim committed sexual assault on Jan. 15,” Bae Bok-joo, deputy chair of the party, said in a press conference Monday. “The victim is Rep. Jang Hye-young, a member of the party.” 

The alleged assault took place on Jan. 15 after a dinner, and Jang filed a complaint with the party on Jan. 18. Bae, who is also in charge of the party’s gender and human rights division, said the party had conducted a one-week investigation.   
   
“The outcome was reported to the leadership earlier this morning, a serious discussion followed and a swift decision was made since it involves the party’s chairman.”   

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but in the past two years the left wing politicians former Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon and former Governor An Hee-jung all involved in sexual assault scandals.

Here is the latest on the case of Olympic champion Shim Suk-hee being sexually assaulted by her coach:

South Korean double Olympic champion skater Shim Suk-hee is seeking a heavier sentence for her former coach, her lawyer said Friday, after he was jailed for more than a decade for sexually assaulting her over several years.

The development came as a former physical therapist was imprisoned for eight years in a separate case for sexually and physically abusing a female triathlete who took her own life.

Short track skater Shim — one of the country’s top female sports stars — went public in 2019 with accusations that coach Cho Jae-beom had sexually abused her for three years, starting when she was 17.

Her action confronted a culture of shame in the socially conservative nation and prompted a series of athletes to come forward with similar allegations, leading to apologies from sporting authorities.

Cho was convicted and sentenced to 10 and a half years in jail by the Suwon District Court on Thursday, but Shim’s lawyer said they will ask the court to impose a longer term.

AFP

You can read more at the link.

It is not surprising that this guy had a mental disorder that led to the subway confrontation:

A 50-something man was sentenced to 20 months in prison on Friday for getting into a “slipper fight” with subway passengers who asked him to wear a face mask due to the coronavirus.

The man was indicted on charges of assaulting two passengers on a Line 2 subway train. During the incident in August, he choked the passengers and slapped their faces with a slipper he was wearing.

“The defendant was not wearing a mask even though it was essential due to COVID-19 and talked in a loud voice on the train before assaulting the passengers,” Judge Lee Sang-hoon of the Seoul Southern District Court said.

“However, we took into consideration the fact that his mental illness appeared to have contributed to the crime,” he said.

Yonhap

There had to be more than just the Malaysian employee involved with this heist of money from this casino on Jeju Island. What did she do wheel out 300 kilogram of money on a dolly through the casino?:

A stash of W8.1 billion has been found in a secret safe at the Landing Casino in the Shinhwa World Marriott Resort on Jeju Island, where billions have gone missing (US$1=W1,097).

Police said Wednesday that the new stash was found in a safe in a secret vault in the casino from where another W14.5 billion in cash had vanished without a trace. 

The secret vault is not the casino’s ordinary safe where chips and gambling money are stored, but a 50 sq.m space containing dozens of safes of different sizes. 

Police discovered the new stash of money while raiding the secret vault after the casino filed a report accusing a female Malaysian executive of making off with the W14.5 billion in crisp W50,000 notes that would have weighed nearly 300 kg.

The 55-year-old woman disappeared last December and is suspected of absconding with the money on behalf of her boss, the troubled Hong Kong-based chairman of Landing International, Yang Zhihui.

Chosun Ilbo

You can read more at the link. but this money could still be stashed around Jeju with some of it already being found by police.

It is pretty horrible that someone would abuse a 16 month old child to death:

The horrific death of a 16-month-old allegedly abused by her adoptive parents has triggered an outpouring of grief nationwide and anger over many missed chances to save her.

The girl, named Jung-in, died at a hospital in western Seoul on Oct. 13, hours after she was taken to the hospital by her adoptive mother.

The National Forensic Service concluded that she died of severe abdominal injuries and internal bleeding that were caused by “strong external force applied on her back.” Signs of prolonged abuse, such as fractured bones and bruises, were also found on her once-healthy body.

Last month, prosecutors charged the adoptive mother, surnamed Jang, with child abuse resulting in death, emotional abuse and neglect. She has been in pretrial detention. The adoptive father was charged with child abuse and neglect.

Jung-in’s case has gained renewed national attention after SBS, a local broadcaster, aired an investigative report over the weekend to reveal the utter brutality of the abuse done to the toddler, and how child welfare agencies and police have squandered golden chances that could have saved her life.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but this was one of those classic cases of all the warning signs being there, but authorities were not willing to do anything about it.

This is part of the reason why the Moon administration has been going after Prosecutor General Yoon Seok-youl because he had his prosecutors investigate this corruption:

Former Justice Minister Cho Kuk’s wife was sentenced by a Seoul court on Wednesday to imprisonment of four years for academic fraud.

The Seoul Central District Court handed down the jail sentence, together with a fine of 500 million won (US$451,000), to Chung Kyung-sim, the wife of the former presidential secretary for civil affairs and a close aide to President Moon Jae-in.

The court also ordered the immediate imprisonment of Chung.

Chung was indicted in November last year on 15 counts of charges related to her daughter’s college admission and her dubious investment in a private equity fund (PEF).

Chung is accused of being involved in fabricating documentation from 2013-2014, including a college presidential citation, in order to get her daughter admitted to medical school.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but I doubt that she will do four years in jail. She will get her sentenced reduced probably on appeal as things tend to happen. Her husband Cho Kuk is still under investigation for his role in these corrupt dealings.

Another member of the Moon administration gets away with committing a crime:

 Police are looking into past cases that are similar to the new vice justice minister’s unpunished assault against a taxi driver to determine whether officers took appropriate steps at the time of the incident, a police official said Monday.

Vice Justice Minister Lee Yong-gu has come under fire after it was reported late last week that he got away free following the altercation in early November. 

Lee, who was a lawyer at the time, allegedly grabbed the driver by the collar in an intoxicated state when the man tried to wake him up after arriving at his home in southern Seoul. He was appointed vice minister on Dec. 2. 

“We will once again thoroughly review legal precedents with the help of former jurists, lawyers and senior officials who handled the case at the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency,” the official said.

The Seocho Police Station, which has jurisdiction over Lee’s neighborhood, applied charges of assault, a crime not punishable against will, not the heavier charges that apply to assault against a driver in motion.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but can you imagine the reaction if it was a drunk USFK service member that assaulted a cab driver

Yet former President Park was confined before her trial for something far less serious than what this mayor is accused of and in the case of the sexual assault already admitted to doing:

Oh, who was elected in 2018 as a member of the ruling Democratic Party, stepped down as Busan mayor in April after admitting during a live press conference he had sexually assaulted a City Hall employee in his office.  
   
Earlier this week, prosecutors filed a second arrest warrant for Oh after the first request was turned down in June. Prosecutors said they had found new evidence Oh had inappropriate contact with another woman by touching her chin, and attempting to touch other areas of her body on multiple occasions in November and December 2018.    
   
Oh admitted in April to the sexual assault that led to his resignation. At his court hearing Friday, he admitted to the additional assaults, saying “the words of the women are all correct.” The ex-mayor added he did not remember the incidents, but that he apologizes for them.  
   
The presiding judge of the Busan District Court who reviewed Oh’s warrant hearing said there was no reason to put him under pretrial detention as he has accepted the charges and does not pose a flight risk. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but this is why the Moon administration had to suspend the Prosecutor General, to assist his political cronies.

All this guy received was an apology after being locked up for 20 years as an innocent man:

A South Korean man, who was imprisoned for 20 years after being wrongfully convicted of raping and killing a 13-year-old girl in 1988, was acquitted of the crime in a retrial Thursday.

The Suwon District Court in Suwon, south of Seoul, overturned the original conviction of Yoon Seong-yeo, a 53-year-old, and declared him not guilty in a retrial of the 1988 murder case linked to one of the nation’s most notorious serial killings.

The court offered an apology to Yoon on behalf of the judiciary, saying the incorrect ruling of the past was made due to wrongful acts by investigation agencies.

Yoon’s case was classified as the eighth case of 10 serial murders that had occurred between 1986 and 1991 in Hwaseong, a Gyeonggi Province city about 60 kilometers south of Seoul.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.