Category: crime & punishment

This is very weird especially since the police are focusing on suicide as the cause for at least four of the deaths:

A family of five has been found dead in three different locations in and around Seoul, and police are investigating connections into their deaths, police said Saturday. 

Police received a report at 7:29 a.m. of a 40-year-old woman having jumped off an apartment building in Songpa in eastern Seoul, officials said. 

She was sent to a hospital in cardiac arrest but later pronounced dead.

While police were checking the woman’s whereabouts in the lead-up to her death, they discovered her husband, mother- and sister-in-law dead in a residence in the same district. 

Police then found the couple’s teenage daughter dead at a hotel in Gimpo, just west of Seoul. 

Police said a note was found at one of the scenes that indicated a conflict over money. 

Police said they believe four of them, excluding the daughter, took their own lives, and an autopsy will be carried out on her to figure out the exact cause of death.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It is good to see how stringent the rape sentences have been getting in South Korea because it was not like this in the past:

In this file photo, a man, known as the “spin kick assailant” for his brutal attacks on a female stranger, leaves a court in the southeastern port city of Busan on June 12, 2023. (Yonhap)

The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a 20-year prison sentence for the so-called spin kick assailant in the southeastern port city of Busan, who caused social outrage last year due to his brutal attacks on a female stranger for the purpose of rape.

The defendant, whose identity has been withheld, is accused of following the victim, to whom he had no personal connection, for 10 minutes all the way to her apartment’s elevator on May 22, 2022, knocking her out with a roundhouse kick to the back of the head and then continually assaulting her until she passed out.

He was given a 12-year prison term on charges of attempted murder by a district court in October last year, but the Busan High Court raised the sentence to 20 years in June after prosecutors changed his charge to attempted rape murder after detecting his DNA in her jeans.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

In South Korea getting these exam questoins would be a huge advantage to the test takers:

Vice Education Minister Jang Sang-yoon announces the results of a crackdown on illegal activities by teachers in a news conference in the central city of Sejong on Sept. 19, 2023. (Yonhap)

Twenty-four high school teachers have been caught selling exam questions to private academies before or after serving as test makers for the College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) and mock CSAT exams in violation of the current laws, the education ministry said Tuesday.

The ministry said it will file criminal complaints against four of the teachers on charges of obstruction of business and ask for an investigation into 22 of them on suspicion of violating anti-graft laws. Two of them will face both criminal complaints and investigation, it added.

The four teachers facing criminal complaints are accused of serving as CSAT and mock CSAT test makers after hiding the fact that they sold practice exam questions to private education companies, it said.

On the other hand, the 22 teachers facing an investigation have been caught selling exam questions to private companies after participating in CSAT and mock CSAT test-making, it said. All CSAT test makers are obliged by law to keep all test-related information confidential.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

You would think these idiots would do a Google search to see how many former USFK servicemembers have been caught smuggling drugs through the mail to realize it is not worth it:

This photo provided by police shows a raid on the home of a USFK soldier suspected of being involved in drug trafficking. (PHOTO NOT FOR SALE) (Yonhap)

A United States Forces Korea (USFK) service member has been arrested on charges of smuggling drugs from the U.S. via military mail and using, selling or distributing them in South Korea, police said Wednesday.

The 24-year-old service member is accused of illegally importing 350 ml of synthetic cannabis through USFK mail between February last year and May this year, and smoking, selling or distributing them to USFK soldiers and others together with two civilian women, according to the Gyeonggi Pyeongtaek Police Station.

The service member assigned to Camp Humphreys in Pyeongtaek, 61 kilometers south of Seoul, allegedly used plastic containers for drug smuggling, taking advantage of the fact that it is not easy to distinguish between liquid synthetic cannabis and liquid electronic cigarettes. 

The smuggled drugs have been mostly sold to U.S. soldiers stationed in Pyeongtaek and Dongducheon, 41 km north of Seoul, through the two women and five others, the police station said.

It said the two women — a South Korean and a Filipino — have been arrested on drug trafficking charges and transferred to the prosecution for indictment. In addition, 17 other U.S. soldiers have been apprehended and sent to the prosecution without detention on suspicion of being involved in the purchases and sales of the banned substance.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Very convenient that Lee Jae-myung checks himself into a hospital due to his so call hunger strike when prosecutors issue an arrest warrant for him:

Democratic Party of Korea head Rep. Lee Jae-myung, who is on day 19 of his hunger strike against the Yoon Suk Yeol administration, is transferred out of his office on a stretcher Monday morning. (Yonhap)

Rep. Lee Jae-myung, the bedridden leader of the Democratic Party of Korea on a strike against what he calls President Yoon Suk Yeol’s “tyrannical rule,” is wanted by prosecutors on an arrest warrant request for the second time this year.

Seoul prosecutors said Monday they filed a request for an arrest warrant against Lee, who is already a defendant in two corruption trials, on three different counts of accusations.

One is that he colluded with a policy aide while he was mayor of Seongnam to hand favors such as a change in land permits to private developers, allowing them to illicitly profit from a city development project. The second is that he personated a prosecutor, and then asked a witness to testify falsely in court. The last is that he, as governor of Gyeonggi Province, paid North Korean authorities to organize his Pyongyang trip and to negotiate the province’s business deals with North Korea.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

This is a horrible crime that happened over in Yeongam. According to the article the 59-year old farmer was facing a sex crime charge before he and the whole family was found dead:

A couple in their 50s and their three sons with severe disabilities were found dead at their house in the southwestern county of Yeongam, police said Friday.

Police discovered the bodies of the 59-year-old farmer known by his family name Kim, his 56-year-old wife and their three sons in their 20s in the afternoon, after visiting the house following a report from a neighbor that blood stains were found near the windows.

The heavily bleeding bodies were found in two separate rooms and a weapon was found at the scene, according to officials.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Well this guy has self selected himself out of the military:

Police in Seoul arrested an American soldier on suspicion of driving drunk in a stolen minivan in the city early Sunday.

The minivan’s owner reported his Hyundai Staria had disappeared around 4:10 a.m. from its streetside parking spot in the Jongno district, a detective from the district’s police station told Stars and Stripes by phone Monday.

South Korean officials regularly speak to the media on the customary condition of anonymity.

Seoul police pulled the vehicle over less than a half-mile from its parking spot, the detective said. The driver, a U.S. soldier in his 30s under the influence of alcohol, told police he found the keys to the minivan and “accidentally” took the car, the detective said.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

This is a horrible murder over in Gimhae:

A man was arrested on Tuesday after a failed attempt to take his own life after killing his two children.

Gimhae Jungbu Police Station announced Tuesday that a man in his 50s is being investigated on charges of murdering his two children on a hill in Gimhae, South Gyeongsang Province.

According to the police, the man is suspected of murdering his two children — his 17-year-old daughter and 16-year-old son — in his vehicle.

The daughter’s teacher reported the teenager’s absence from school, and the police found the man at the crime scene at 12:20 p.m. the previous day by tracking the location of his mobile phone. They arrested him at 3:07 p.m.

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

This is pretty weird:

Four men were found dead Saturday at a bed and breakfast facility in Bundang, south of Seoul, sending police to investigate the cause of the deaths.

Police received a report from the operator of the lodging service around noon that “four men were left dead in the same room.”

The four in their 30s and 40s reportedly arrived at the lodging establishment the previous evening. Police said no signs of foul play have been found in connection with the deaths so far, adding an investigation will be launched as to how they were related to each other and the exact circumstances of the deaths.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Can you imagine how many US politicians would be sent to jail for defaming former Presidents if Korean defamation laws were implemented in the US?:

Deputy National Assembly Speaker Chung Jin-Suk was convicted Thursday of defaming the honor of late President Roh Moo-hyun with his derisive remarks about Roh’s tragic death.

Judge Park Byung-gon of the Seoul Central District Court sentenced the fifth-term lawmaker of the ruling People Power Party to six months in prison, a ruling heavier than the prosecution’s demand for a fine of 5 million won (US$3,793). He was not taken into custody immediately.

If the sentence is confirmed by the Supreme Court, Chung will lose his parliamentary seat. 

The charges against Chung stem from a post he made on his Facebook account in September 2017, commenting on Roh’s suicide death in May 2009 amid a corruption investigation.

Chung claimed Roh’s wife, Kwon Yang-sook, and their son had received millions of dollars in bribes from a businessman close to the president.

He further claimed that following an investigation by the prosecution into the allegations, a domestic dispute ensued between the couple and she left their home. On that night, Roh, left alone, took his own life, Chung wrote.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.