Advertisement

We need your help now

Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.

You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.

If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.

AP/Press Association Images

Captain of Korean ferry that killed over 300 escapes death penalty but sentenced to 36 years in prison

A three-judge panel said prosecutors failed to prove Lee Jun-Seok had acted intentionally.

THE CAPTAIN OF the South Korean ferry that sank in April with the loss of more than 300 lives has been jailed for 36 years today, but acquitted of murdering those who died in the disaster.

In a ruling that followed five months of dramatic, often painful testimony, a three-judge court said prosecutors, who had demanded the death penalty, failed to prove Captain Lee Jun-Seok, 69, had acted with an intention to kill.

However, he was convicted of gross negligence and dereliction of duty, including abandoning his vessel while hundreds of passengers — most of them schoolchildren — remained trapped on board.

Victims’ relatives who were present in the courtroom in the southern city of Gwangju, reacted furiously to the murder acquittal.

“Where is the justice?” one woman shouted at the judges, while others wept openly.

“It’s not fair. What about the lives of our children? They (the defendants) deserve worse than death,” screamed another.

s-korea-ferry-2 Thejournal Thejournal

Three other senior crew members, who had also faced homicide charges, were sentenced to jail terms of between 15 and 30 years.

“We find it hard to conclude that the defendants … were aware that all of the victims would die because of their actions and they had an intention to kill them,” Judge Lim Joung-Youb said in announcing the verdict.

“Therefore the murder charges are not accepted.”

lee-joong-seok-310x415 Lee Joon-seok, the captain of the sunken ferry. AP Photo AP Photo

However, Lim stressed that had Lee and his crew acted properly as soon as the Sewol ran into trouble, then many lives might have been saved.

Lee and his crew were vilified in the wake of the 16 April disaster and, with emotions running sky high across the country over the loss of so many young lives, some legal experts had raised doubts over whether they would receive a fair trial.

- © AFP, 2014

Read: Captain and three top crew of sunken South Korean ferry charged with manslaughter

Read: Two dead and up to 295 missing after South Korean ferry sinks

Author
View 12 comments
Close
12 Comments
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Tony Gordon
    Favourite Tony Gordon
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 8:12 PM

    They are only scratching the surface with this research

    102
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute FlopFlipU
    Favourite FlopFlipU
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 8:21 PM

    @Tony Gordon: yes itchy and scratchy

    16
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Ciaran Fairley
    Favourite Ciaran Fairley
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 8:23 PM

    @Tony Gordon: That comment really got under my skin lol.

    28
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Canny Jem
    Favourite Canny Jem
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 9:04 PM

    A very unpleasant thing. Apart from abnormal skin conditions, frequent excessive intake of coffee and alcohol leads to skin dryness – which causes excessive itchiness which leads to excessive scratching – and risk of scrab cuts, which can become infected by scratching with unclean fingernails.
    The fore-arms, back of neck and the back are most often affected. Unless primarily due to piles, the coffee/alcohol itchiness also can occur between the legs and buttocks.
    Moisturising creams are not worth their expensive costs. Use a litre of warm water with a capful of liquid dettol disinfectant for skin treatment mixed in (not the sink/WC disinfectant kind) to wipe the affected area(s). To reach the back areas, use a hand-towel soaked in the warm water/dettol mix and rub all over as if drying your back.
    Do this daily or as needed. Sorted. Then back to the booze and coffee, ad infinitum.
    Or just ease off the excessive coffee and booze.

    39
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute TamuMassif2019
    Favourite TamuMassif2019
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 10:56 PM

    So an itchy hand doesn’t mean your going to get money???

    18
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute David Jordan
    Favourite David Jordan
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 9:12 PM

    Here’s a great article about a woman who developed Shingles secondary to HIV infection, the infection caused nerve damage to her scalp and skull, her brain rewired nerves to the Itch centre of her brain (we now know it’s the periaqueductal gray), similar to a phantom limb. She eventually literally scratched through her skull and injured her brain:

    https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/06/30/the-itch

    “One morning, after she was awakened by her bedside alarm, she sat up and, she recalled, “this fluid came down my face, this greenish liquid.” She pressed a square of gauze to her head and went to see her doctor again. M. showed the doctor the fluid on the dressing. The doctor looked closely at the wound. She shined a light on it and in M.’s eyes. Then she walked out of the room and called an ambulance. Only in the Emergency Department at Massachusetts General Hospital, after the doctors started swarming, and one told her she needed surgery now, did M. learn what had happened. She had scratched through her skull during the night—and all the way into her brain.”

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periaqueductal_gray

    9
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute ihcalaM
    Favourite ihcalaM
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 9:22 PM

    @David Jordan: Unreal, thanks for sharing

    15
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Alan McDonald
    Favourite Alan McDonald
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 9:42 PM

    @David Jordan: Just before bed. Thanks.

    24
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute Shane Curran
    Favourite Shane Curran
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 8:23 PM

    What the hell are they talking about?

    11
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute White Rabbit
    Favourite White Rabbit
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 8:22 PM

    If it wasn’t for those pesky peptide receptors.

    3
    Install the app to use these features.
    Mute MitchConnor
    Favourite MitchConnor
    Report
    Jan 6th 2019, 11:16 PM

    The brain tells me? What, so where am I in the body then ?

    2
Submit a report
Please help us understand how this comment violates our community guidelines.
Thank you for the feedback
Your feedback has been sent to our team for review.
JournalTv
News in 60 seconds