Tag: assault

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.

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

Cho Hyun-ah just can’t stay out of the news:

Former Korean Air vice president and “nut rage” heiress Cho Hyun-ah was fined 30 million won ($2,460) for assaulting her husband but cleared of abusing her twin children by throwing a spoon at them and verbally abusing them.

Judge In Jin-sup made the ruling recently, the Seoul Central District Court said on Thursday.

While it’s not yet known if Cho will appeal, her husband, surnamed Kim, has appealed, arguing the court’s decision on the child abuse was wrong. 

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but she supposedly tried to choke the husband and then threw a Tablet PC at him.

It looks like someone got really stupid in Itaewon this weekend and caused yet another Taxi Cab Related Incident. Via U.S. Army WTF Moments:

Here is what the USFK commander General Abrams had to say about this incident:

Being a good battlebuddy includes being with your battle buddy and not letting them wander off.

We are guests here. We are also Ambassadors who represent our country on and off duty. Below is an example of not being a good Ambassador. https://t.co/Dw4FVkxMAd

— Robert Abrams (@DogFaceSoldier) July 21, 2019

As I have always said every time the curfew has been lifted, is that just the large number of U.S. troops in Korea means that eventually a stupid or criminal incident will happen. If the command is not willing to absorb blowback from incidents like this, then why the lift the curfew in the first place?

I guess we will see if the curfew returns or not.

Here is another one of these incidents where there is likely more to the story and both sides at fault, but radicals from each side will manipulate facts to push their agendas:

A recent assault case involving three men and two women at a bar near Isu Subway Station in Seoul — better known as the “Isu Station assault” case — has triggered an unexpected gender war online, after the women said they were attacked by men for their feminist choices, while others accused them of fabricating the account.

More than 350,000 Koreans signed an online petition asking for the presidential office to punish the three men after one of the two women claimed online that she and her sister were physically attacked for “not wearing makeup” and “having short hair.”

The woman, who is in her early 20s, said she deliberately chose the look — no makeup with short hair — as part of the “escape the corset” movement, a Korean feminist movement that rejects makeup and the rigid standards of beauty imposed particularly on young women in Korean society.  [Korea Herald]

You can read the rest at the link.

Even if the two servicemembers involved poorly parked their vehicle it is no excuse for the horrible actions these two civilians took:

A 71-year-old woman was arrested after she lunged at and hit a pregnant servicemember at a Cheddar’s in Macon, Ga., police said. Videos of the Saturday incident, which police said was sparked by a disagreement over parking, have drawn millions of views as they spread across social media.

Judy Tucker was arrested on Saturday, charged with simple battery and released a few hours later on $650 bail. According to a Bibb County Sheriff’s Office report, Tucker told police that the incident with servicemembers Stephanie Mitchell and Treasure Sharpe, who are black, “all started because she was white and it was a race issue.” Tucker’s son approached the women when they were backing into a parking space and told them they “should learn how to park” and called them a profane name, the report quoted Mitchell as saying.

Mitchell said that, inside the restaurant, Tucker’s son again called them the profane name and said that they were black lesbians.   [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link, but the Tucker’s should be ashamed and embarrassed by their inappropriate and racist comments if the alleged actions are all true.

I don’t know what it is about subways in South Korea, but it tends to bring the worst out of people.  Here is yet another example:

Three Americans, including a 32-year-old hagwon teacher, went on a rampage on a subway train, Friday, attacking and harassing passengers.

The three are now under police investigation.

According to police, a woman hit a Korean man and abused him on the train at around 5 p.m. The man suffered bruises and cuts to his face.

Police said the three attacked the man after he asked them to “be quiet.”

A video clip that went viral shows that at least one American made racist gestures to passengers and swore at them. Some passengers moved away.

“The three were sober at that time ― one was found to be a English teacher from an academy in Gangnam,” a police spokesperson said.  [Korea Times]

ROK Heads can watch the Youtube video at this link.  The video does not show the supposed assault just the women acting like fools afterwards.

I guess these South Korean journalists forgot they are in a country without freedom of the press:

More than a dozen Chinese security guards beat and injured a South Korean photojournalist who was covering a business function attended by South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Thursday hours before his summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

The incident occurred at a convention center in Beijing where a trade fair was held involving some 200 South Korean firms and 500 prospective Chinese buyers. Moon is currently on a four-day state visit to China that began Wednesday.

A group of 14 South Korean journalists was covering the event when the Chinese guards blocked them from following the president who was then visiting various booths of South Korean firms at the fair, according to pool reports.

The journalists protested the blockage and one of them, a photojournalist, was taken outside of the venue by some 15 Chinese security guards.

The journalist took a severe beating while being completely surrounded by the guards despite strong protests from his colleagues and South Korean officials, including those from the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae.

The journalist was taken to a hospital after Moon’s medical staff examined him and said he required intensive treatment, according to Cheong Wa Dae pool reports.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but I doubt anything is going to happen to these security guards.  The Chinese government had mobs go and beat down Koreans in the streets of Seoul before and nothing happened to them.  They were instead considered national heroes.

I would not be surprised if the assault was deliberate to send a message to South Korean journalists which the Chinese state run media has been criticizing over their coverage of President Moon’s visit to China.

Via a reader tip comes this absolutely horrible assault of a 14-year old girl in Busan:

A horrific attack in South Korea’s Province of Busan has caused outrage around the globe after pictures of the victim were revealed online.

A group of middle school students attacked and nearly killed a 14-year-old girl in Busan, South Korea. The four attackers were captured on CCTV attacking the girl with a metal pipe, a chair, several soju bottles, and lit cigarettes. The girls then took pictures of the bloodied victim after the attack and sent it to other students to ‘brag’ about what they did.

While the victim was 14 years old, three of her attackers were of the same age as she was too. One of the attackers was only 13 years old. They attacked her for 1 hour and 30 minutes before leaving her to die.  [Viral 4 Real]

You can read the rest at the link, but this was actually the second time they assaulted her in response to the victim accepting a phone call from the boyfriend of one of the attackers.

I suspect it was more than playing golf that got his wife this upset to cut off his penis and flush it down the toilet:

A woman has been arrested on charges of cutting off her husband’s penis while he was sleeping, police said Monday.

According to Yeosu Police Station, the incident happened at an apartment in Yeosu, South Jeolla Province, at 11:58 p.m. on Saturday.

The woman, 54, whose is unidentified, allegedly cut off the tip of the penis with a kitchen knife and flushed the flesh down the toilet.

A neighbor found the husband, left in pain, and took him to a nearby hospital, where he is in stable condition.

A police investigation revealed that the couple were on unhealthy terms.

Not only had the husband been violent to the woman, she had harbored a grudge because he gave her no money, but spent lavishly on his own enjoyment, such as like playing golf. [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.