A South Korean court has given three police officers prison sentences over their handling of a 2022 Halloween crush in a Seoul nightlife district that killed 159 people.
The convictions on Monday are the first over the failure by authorities to prevent or adequately respond to the overcrowding that occurred in the popular Itaewon district. No top-level officials have been charged or held accountable, prompting criticism from bereaved families and opposition politicians.
The crush, one of the biggest peacetime disasters in South Korea, caused a nationwide outpouring of grief. The victims, who were mostly in their 20s and 30s, had gathered in Itaewon for Halloween celebrations.
The Seoul western district court gave three years in prison to Lee Im-jae – the former chief of Seoul’s Yongsan police station, whose jurisdiction includes Itaewon. Another Yongsan police officer was sentenced to two years in prison and a third officer received a suspended two-year term.
The three officers were convicted of professional negligence resulting in death. The court ruled that the crush was not a natural disaster and could have been prevented or the toll reduced if the three officers had prepared properly for the crowd, alerted others of the danger quickly and supervised other police officers appropriately.
The police officers and prosecutors can both appeal.
The court also ruled that Park Hee-young, head of the Yongsan ward office, and three other ward officials were not guilty. It said a ward office was unlikely to have a legal right to control or break up a crowd of people.
Bereaved family members criticised the acquittals of Park and the other ward officials. “Does this make sense? We can’t really accept this,” said Lee Jeong-min, a representative of the families.
In early 2023 a police special investigation concluded that police and municipal officials had failed to formulate effective crowd control measures despite anticipating a huge number of people in Itaewon. Investigators said police also ignored hotline calls by pedestrians who warned of swelling crowds before the surge turned deadly.
With Associated Press
