Tag: crime

Here is another story of a senior military leader in big trouble.  This time Colonel David Cockrum the former commander of the 51st Medical Group on Osan Airbase was charged with sexually assaulting two male servicemembers, but was found not guilty of those charges, but was instead found guilty of conduct unbecoming an officer for fraternizing with the male servicemembers:

An Air Force colonel with nearly 20 years of service was found not guilty of sexual assault during his court-martial last week.

Col. David Cockrum, former commander of the 51st Medical Group at Osan Air Base, South Korea, was found not guilty of two specifications of sexual assault and one specification of abusive sexual contact in violation of Article 120 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, Pacific Air Forces spokesman Col. David Honchul told Air Force Times on Tuesday.

Cockrum was found guilty of one charge of conduct unbecoming an officer. According to court documents, he faced that charge because he did “knowingly fraternize with enlisted persons, on terms of military equality  … such conduct being to the prejudice of good order and discipline in the armed forces,” between July 2014 and March 2015.

The military judge sentenced him to 30 days confinement, forfeiture of $5,000 pay per month for eight months ($40,000 total), and a reprimand, Honchul said.  [Air Force Times]

You can read more at the link.

This has to horrible news to the residents of this apartment who have been using the tap water contaminated with a decomposed corpse:

A body was found in a water tank on the roof of an apartment block in Gumi, North Gyeongsang Province, local daily Kyunghyang Shinmun reported Tuesday.

Management staff at the apartments in Gongdan-dong found the body of a 38-year-old Chinese at 1:30 p.m. Monday after a resident complained that the tap water had a bad smell.

“The body had no particular injuries,” police said. “The Chinese is presumed to have been dead for two weeks.”

Police are investigating and an autopsy will be held Wednesday.

Gumi City has provided bottles of mineral water to apartment residents as an emergency measure. [Korea Times]

I would not be surprised if this was North Korean payback for restaurant defections that happened last month.  If this was a murder by the North Koreans I wonder what the Chinese reaction will be to Kim regime agents murdering Chinese citizens?:

An ethnic Korean clergyman with Chinese nationality has been found dead in a northeastern Chinese town close to the border with North Korea, a North Korea watcher said on Sunday, raising suspicions that the North could possibly be involved in his death.

The body of the priest, identified by his surname Han and known for his activities in support of North Korean defectors, was found Saturday afternoon, the watcher said, speculating that he may have been murdered.

Chinese police have immediately launched a probe into Han’s death.

Han is known for serving at Changbai Church in Changbai County, Jilin Province, a region that is populated by the Chaoxian people, or ethnic Koreans living in China.

“Han had been active in supporting North Korean defectors,” the watcher said. “Murder seems the most likely cause of his death.”  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

Three British males are in big trouble after allegedly sexually assaulting two Korean women and then beating up a bystander that tried to intervene in Itaewon:

Apparently 3 British foreigners were sexually harrassing and assaulting 2 girls and a passerby dude stepped in to intervene.

But he ended up being beaten.

Seems like they’re being investigated but released from jail.  [Reddit Korea via KBS and Naver]

You can read more at the link.

A bunch of 2nd Infantry Division soldiers have apparently made themselves eligible for Army downsizing after being punished for the brawl they were part of at the UN Club in Itaewon:

The Army has punished nine soldiers for a brawl in Seoul’s Itaewon entertainment district, a 2nd Infantry Division spokesman said Tuesday.

 

Video that has been circulating on social media since shortly after the January fight shows a group of foreigners brawling in the street in front of the UN Club, a nightspot popular with U.S. troops that’s a few minutes’ walk from Yongsan Garrison, headquarters of 8th Army and U.S. Forces Korea.

 

The brawl involved both men and women trading punches and wrestling on the ground, oblivious to the efforts of a lone, bespectacled South Korean police officer to bring the situation under control with a glowing-red traffic wand.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read the rest at the link, but here is the Youtube video of the brawl, what disgrace:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEtOGx1PDSc

People should be careful who they meet up with through Kakao:

A Korean man in his 20s got arrested for having multiple sexual activities with underage girls that he met through the social network.

Anaheim police department arrested a Korean man Mr. Kim last 29th of March for having sexual relationships and raping teen girls.

According to the Anaheim police, Kim contacted a 13-year-old girl through messaging app on the phone in 2014.

Kim then met the teen girl at a shopping mall in Irvine and took her to his house in La Habra and raped her.

The Anaheim police officers started sting operation and engaged in social network with Mr. Kim, disguised as the girl. Kim, thinking the officers were teenage girl, sent photos of his private body parts and offered her to have sexual activities.

Kim went out to the park in Anaheim not realizing the girl was actually the police officer and was arrested.  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.

Here is another example of a race baiting article being pushed by the media insinuating that the poor black soldier in this article that could not afford an attorney is some how getting treated unfairly compared to the white soldier who’s family could afford a civilian attorney.  The article claims they committed similar crimes and received very different sentences.  However, upon closer scrutiny the two crimes were very different and tried in different court systems thus different outcomes not that facts matter in click bait articles like this:

Two soldiers from the same Joint Base Lewis-McChord infantry battalion experienced two very different kinds of justice when they came home from training events a year apart and carried out deadly crimes.

Pvt. Jeremiah Hill, prosecuted in Army court, received a sentence of 45 years in prison for knifing another soldier in the heart on a Lakewood street.

The rookie soldier from a poor Chicago family had an Army-provided defense attorney and rarely showed remorse when he testified.

Spc. Skylar Nemetz, prosecuted in Pierce County Superior Court, last week received a sentence of less than 14 years for causing the death of his wife, Danielle, when he accidentally shot her in the head with a rifle.

His Northern California family reached deep into their savings to hire an experienced private attorney. Nemetz wept on the witness stand and persuaded a jury he didn’t mean to kill his wife.

The disparities in outcomes for two soldiers from the 5th Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment show the differences in what can happen when the Army and Pierce County carry out their informal agreement to decide which agency should prosecute soldiers who commit crimes outside of JBLM. [News Tribune]

You can read the rest at the link to learn the details of each case.

At least the Korean courts have decided to keep this dirt bag in jail.  I can remember the days when the Korean courts were so weak on sexual assault that they were letting rapists routinely go free:

The Seoul High Court turned down a sexually abusive stepfather’s appeal for a lighter sentence Sunday.

The convicted, 48, was charged for abusing his sleeping stepdaughter, 25, and later threatening her with physical violence in an attempt to prevent her from alerting authorities.

In the original trial he received five years in prison for incestuous sexual assault, but later appealed, saying his sentence was too heavy.

The appeals court turned down his plea in a decision saying, “The nature of the defendant’s crime is malignant as he had not only sexually assaulted his own stepdaughter, but also threatened her with a weapon to cover up his crime.”  [Korea Herald]

Some people should not be allowed to board a airplane.  This story makes me wonder if alcohol was in any way involved or if he is just an old guy with mental issues?:

 A Japan-bound airplane returned to Hawaii because of a violent passenger who wanted to do yoga instead of sit in his seat, the FBI said.

The pilot of the March 26 United Airlines flight from Honolulu International Airport to Narita International Airport turned the plane around after hearing that Hyongtae Pae was yelling at crew members and shoving his wife, the FBI said in a criminal complaint.

Pae told the FBI he didn’t want to sit in his seat during the meal service, so he went to the back of the plane to do yoga and meditate. He became angry when his wife and flight attendants told him to return to his seat. “Pae pushed his wife because she was trying to make him stop,” the complaint said. “He felt that she was siding with the flight crew.”

He tried to head-butt and bite Marines who were passengers on the flight and tried to force him back to his seat, Assistant U.S. Attorney Darren Ching said at Pae’s detention hearing Wednesday.

According to the complaint, he threatened to kill passengers and was yelling that there is no god.

Pae went into a rage because he felt the flight crew was ordering him around, Ching said.

Ching said Pae shouldn’t be released because he’s a danger to his wife, himself and others. Pae urinated on himself and was on suicide watch at the Honolulu Federal Detention Center, Ching said.  [Associated Press]

You can read more at the link.