Category: crime & punishment

I guess we will see how far the ubiquitous Korean defense of “I was drunk” works for this Mongolian judge:

A high-ranking Mongolian official accused of groping a South Korean flight attendant last week appears to have backed down from his initial denial of charges during his latest questioning, police said Thursday.

Dorj Odbayar, the chairman of Mongolia’s Constitutional Court, is alleged to have touched the buttocks of a female flight attendant and intimidated a Mongolian crew member on a Korean Air flight from Ulaanbaatar to Incheon, west of Seoul, on late Oct. 31. 

During an interrogation by airport police last Friday, he flatly denied the charges, saying he was mistaken for another Mongolian man, who actually committed the crime. He left the country immediately after the probe. 

Odbayar returned to South Korea on Wednesday and was detained for a second questioning by the Incheon Metropolitan Police Agency. 

He testified that he did not remember what happened because he was drunk at the time of the incident, according to the Incheon police.

“If the victims made such claims, (I) might have done so under the influence of alcohol,” Odbayar was quoted as saying during the nine-hour interrogation. He was released at midnight. 

He had planned to depart for Mongolia in two days, but the authorities had already banned him from leaving the country for 10 days pending the probe. 

Police also requested Interpol put on its wanted list a Mongolian official accompanying him, who has been accused of molesting another stewardess, including wrapping his arms around her shoulders.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Here is an odd story involving a Korean student attending Boston College:

Alexander Urtula was all set to graduate from Boston College at 10 a.m. on May 20. The 22-year-old was an exemplary student, a biology major and a member of the school’s Philippine Society, and his parents were in town from New Jersey to watch him receive his diploma. But just hours before the ceremony, Urtula leapt to his death from the top floor of a parking garage in Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood. 

According to a press release from the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office, his girlfriend of 18 months, 21-year-old Inyoung You, has been indicted on charges of involuntary manslaughter over his suicide. She was “physically, verbally and psychologically abusive” towards Urtula, according to the DA’s office, and repeatedly told him to “go kill himself” and to “go die.” The abuse, which has allegedly been documented in their more than 75,000 text messages, became “more frequent, more powerful and more demeaning” in the hours leading up to his death. You, a fellow Boston College student from South Korea, had tracked Urtula’s location on her phone, and was there when he jumped.

According to the DA’s press release, an investigation revealed that You knew about her boyfriend’s “spiraling depression and suicidal thoughts” brought on by the texts—still, she wrote him and encouraged him to die.

Elle

You can read more at the link, You left school in August and returned back to South Korea. U.S. authorities say they will try and extradite her if she does not voluntarily return for trial.

I absolutely called this one that the next time we see Cho Kuk’s younger brother he would be in a wheelchair. He had earlier tried to avoid arrest by claiming he had a bad back, now he is wheelchair bound and even added a neck brace for added dramatic effect:

The prosecution again sought an arrest warrant for a younger brother of former Justice Minister Cho Kuk on Tuesday over a hiring scandal and an alleged fake lawsuit surrounding a private school foundation run by his family.

State prosecutors asked a Seoul court to issue a warrant to formally detain the 52-year-old man over charges, including breach of duty, bribery, obstruction of justice and aiding and abetting destruction of evidence.

The brother, who worked at the Woongdong school foundation, is alleged to have leaked test questions and answers to two people who applied to teaching posts at a middle school run by the foundation and received 210 million won (US$180,102)

He is also suspected of incurring financial losses to the school foundation by filing a fraudulent lawsuit against it over construction costs.

The prosecution claimed the younger Cho should be arrested, given that two brokers who gave the money to him were already taken into custody. A court review of the request will be held probably on Thursday.

The prosecution earlier sought an arrest warrant for him, but a local court rejected to issue it on Oct. 9, saying the charges are disputable.

If the warrant is issued, he would be the third member of the former minister’s family to be arrested.

Chung Kyung-sim, Cho’s wife, was arrested last week on a total of 11 counts of charges including an alleged forgery of a school award for her daughter and a dubious investment in a private equity fund. A son of Cho’s cousin involved in the fund was also arrested in mid-September.

Yonhap

As you can see the Korean media continues to blur the faces of those involved with the Cho Kuk scandal. For this brother they don’t even give his name instead call him the younger Cho. This very much unlike what they did with everyone involved with the President Park Geun-hye impeachment who the media did everything possible to personally destroy.

I wonder why the media is blurring out her face when everyone accused of wrong doing in the Park Geun-hye impeachment had their faces widely published across the Korean media?:

Chung Kyung-sim, wife of former Justice Minister Cho Kuk, attended a hearing at the Seoul Central District Court Wednesday to challenge the prosecution’s request to put her behind bars as it investigates corruption allegations against her. 

Chung, a professor from Dongyang University, entered the court building in southern Seoul around 10:10 a.m., making her first appearance before the press since the prosecution started its probe 57 days ago. Chung is being investigated for possible irregularities in her daughter’s admissions application to medical school and alleged corruption in managing the family’s wealth.

Following dozens of raids including her residence and seven rounds of questioning of Chung, the Special Investigation Department II of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office asked the Seoul Central District Court on Monday to issue a warrant to detain Chung. In its warrant application, prosecutors listed 11 charges against her, which they say require pretrial detention. They also claim that evidence destruction is a worry. 

About 100 reporters asked Chung various questions, but she only replied, “I will faithfully face the hearing,” before entering the building.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

Anyone surprised by this news?:

Prosecutors investigating former Justice Minister Cho Kuk’s family appear to have found evidence that Cho’s younger brother, who faces allegations of receiving bribes from teachers at a school operated by the Cho family, did not fall and hurt his back as he claims. 

Sources with knowledge of the ongoing probe at the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office told the JoongAng Ilbo earlier this week that prosecutors thoroughly reviewed CCTV footage from the area where Cho’s brother asserted he fell but found zero proof to corroborate his claims.

Prosecutors are planning to submit the footage to a court in the coming days when filing a second request to detain him before his trial, the sources continued, in order to dissuade the court from striking down the pretrial detention warrant because he’s injured.

The Seoul Central District Court dismissed the prosecution’s first warrant for him last week, saying his allegations were “open to doubt” and enough evidence collection has already taken place. The court also cited the younger Cho’s health in explaining why they decided not to detain him.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but next we will probably see him in a wheel chair.

There was more than seven people involved in this crime and why didn’t the police immediately hold them in jail after the crime instead of letting them go?:

 Prosecutors said Sunday they have requested a Seoul court to issue arrest warrants for seven progressive college students on charges of breaking into the U.S. ambassador’s residence.

Seventeen members of a progressive college student group used ladders to climb over the wall of the Habib House in Seoul on Friday afternoon.

The residence was vacant at that time, as Ambassador Harry Harris and his wife were away for a Cheong Wa Dae reception hosted by President Moon Jae-in.

The activists displayed banners reading “Harris leave this land,” with two others having attempted to break into the compound. They were protesting Washington’s call for Seoul to sharply increase its financial contribution to the presence of American troops in South Korea.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but I doubt any real consequences will come from this.

This is interesting, one of the murders that the Hwaseong Serial Killer has admitted to already had someone jailed for the crime:

A man who spent nearly 20 years in prison for raping and killing a teenage girl is seeking a retrial to be exonerated after the notorious Hwaseong serial killer claimed responsibility for what was believed to be a “copycat” murder.

Lawyer Park Joon-young said Wednesday he will represent the man, 52, surnamed Yoon.

“For Yoon, this is a heaven-sent opportunity (to prove his innocence). I won’t waste it,” Park wrote on Facebook. “I will form a team of lawyers and, once completed, reveal their names.”

The development comes after Lee Chun-jae, 56, the prime suspect in at least nine murders between September 1986 and April 1991, claimed responsibility for the Sept. 16, 1988 so-called “copycat” murder ― 30 years after Yoon was convicted of killing the girl, 13, surnamed Park.

Speaking to Channel A, a local broadcaster, Yoon claimed police forced him to make a false confession after they assaulted and tortured him.

Yoon, then 22, was arrested in 1989 for killing the girl at her home. He was later sentenced to life in prison, which the Supreme Court upheld in May 1990. After spending 19 years and six months behind bars, he was released in 2009 for good behavior.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.