The homicide of a South Korean girl who had been stalked by her alleged killer for years has sparked outrage and calls for for modifications within the legislation to higher defend girls.
The girl’s homicide in a rest room on the subway station the place she labored earlier this month has shocked South Korea, coming a day earlier than her alleged attacker, named by police as 31-year-old Jeon Joo-hwan, had been because of be sentenced for stalking her.
The 28-year-old sufferer, who has not been named, was stabbed a number of instances after ending her night shift at Sindang station in central Seoul.
Jeon was reportedly overpowered by different station staff who rushed to the scene after the girl triggered an alarm within the lavatory. She later died in hospital from her accidents.
South Korean media studies alleged Jeon had begun harassing the girl after they started working for Seoul Metro in 2019. He reportedly referred to as her a whole lot of instances begging her for a date and threatened to hurt her if she refused.
After the sufferer reported Jeon final October he was dismissed from his job and arrested, however launched on bail. Like many different stalking suspects, he was not subjected to a restraining order.
“We acknowledge the gravity and cruelty of the crime,” the Yonhap information company quoted a panel of police and consultants as saying in a press release.
Jeon was arrested on prices of homicide, and the ruling on his stalking indictment has been postponed till 29 September.
The girl’s demise has triggered anger and accusations that South Korean authorities are failing to take violence towards girls critically.
The nation’s gender equality and household minister, Kim Hyun-sook, was closely criticised after she mentioned she didn’t consider the girl’s homicide was a gender-based hate crime.
Throughout a go to to Sindang station, Kim advised reporters that she didn’t assume misogyny had been an element. “I don’t agree that this case ought to be framed as males versus girls,” she mentioned. Girls’s rights campaigners identified that just about 80% of stalking victims in South Korea are girls.
Talking within the nationwide meeting this week, Kim sparked extra fury by suggesting that the crime might have been prevented had the sufferer sought recommendation from a ministry helpline and brought different preventive measures.
An anti-stalking legislation carrying a most three-year jail sentence that was handed final October has been condemned as flawed, because it permits police to take motion solely with the consent of the sufferer. That loophole, in line with critics, provides stalkers the chance to stress their victims into dropping their grievance.
Because the legislation got here into pressure, police have made 7,152 arrests for stalking, however solely 5% of the suspects have been detained.
The justice ministry is reportedly contemplating eradicating the consent requirement, however critics have identified {that a} related measure has been stalled within the nationwide meeting for greater than a yr, due partly to resistance from the justice ministry, which argued the brand new anti-stalking legislation could be enough.
Earlier than the brand new legislation was launched, stalking was handled as a misdemeanour in South Korea punishable solely by a modest fantastic, in line with the Korea Herald.
However now stress is mounting on the president, Yoon Suk-yeol, to strengthen the legislation amid proof that stalking usually precedes extra critical crimes.
A latest report by the Korean Nationwide Police College discovered that just about 4 in 10 murders of shut companions had been preceded by stalking incidents.
The homicide case has highlighted South Korea’s persevering with battle towards gender-based crime. The nation has been on the forefront of the #MeToo motion in Asia, partly in response to an epidemic of molka – invasive footage filmed with spy cams that just about all the time targets girls – and anger that authorities weren’t doing sufficient to punish offenders.
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