2심 재판부 "죄질 불량하고 비난 가능성 커…피해자 처벌 불원서 제출 등 참작"
Entrance to the Chuncheon District Court and Seoul High Court Chuncheon Chamber. Yonhap News
A firefighter in his 30s who threatened and beat his wife over several years was sentenced to probation on appeal.
According to Yonhap News on the 11th, the Criminal Division 1 of the Chuncheon Trial Division of the Seoul High Court (Chief Judge Eun-hye Lee) overturned the original sentence of 2 years and 6 months in prison for Mr. A (35), who was indicted on charges of threats of retaliation, special injury, injury, intimidation, and violation of the Animal Protection Act under the Aggravated Punishment Act for Specific Crimes, and sentenced him to 2 years in prison and 4 years probation. He was also ordered to perform 80 hours of community service and take 40 hours of violence treatment classes.
Mr. A, a fire official, was handed over to trial on charges of hitting or threatening his wife B (32) on 20 occasions from May 2020 to October 2023.
According to the indictment, in May 2020, during an argument with Mr. B because he had searched another man’s name on social media, he hit him all over his body, causing injuries that required four weeks of treatment.
In June of the same year, after a conflict with Mr. B over money, he sent a video of his arm bleeding and a text message suggesting suicide.
After marrying Mr. B in July 2021, Mr. A got into an argument about his investment failure and hit Mr. B in anger.
In March 2022, when the police were dispatched for stabbing B’s mattress with a weapon and destroying B’s cell phone, he said to B, ‘If I don’t solve this problem, I will kill your cat, you, and your family even if I have to set people free,’ and ‘Why don’t we see each other at the police station? At that time, I sent a text message saying, ‘I can stab you from the neck, seriously.’
This wasn’t the only thing.
Mr. A sent a video of himself kicking Mr. B’s cat and a photo of him holding the cat’s neck to Mr. B, and also sent a text message saying, “If you fail to handle the report as a special threat and have it reported to your workplace, I will kill your cat, you, and your entire family.” Mr. A later assaulted Mr. B, who returned home because he was worried about the cat.
At the end of 2022, when Mr. B did not come home, he sent a photo of his upper body soaked in blood, or wrote a blood letter on the floor of the house saying “I want to live,” then took a photo and sent it to Mr. B.
In addition, he threatened to spread a sex video, and when Mr. B, who went to his parents’ house, did not receive a call, he sent a photo with a timer set to 4 hours and 30 minutes and threatened to say, ‘If you don’t show up within the time, I will kill all the cats and then you too.’
The Wonju branch of the Chuncheon District Court, which was in charge of the first trial, sentenced the victim to prison, saying, “The victim appears to have felt extreme anxiety and pain in her residence, which should be the safest, and is pleading for severe punishment for the defendant.”
Mr. A then objected to the ruling and appealed. Mr. A claimed, “There was no fact of assaulting or injuring Mr. B, and even if tangible force was used, they merely lightly pushed, pulled, and shoved each other during the couple’s fight. Even if it constitutes an assault, it was self-defense made in the process of stopping Mr. B’s unfair actions,” and added, “The lower court’s judgment erred in misunderstanding the facts or misunderstanding the law.”
Also, in the case of threats of retaliation for reporting 112, he said, “I was angry and made a somewhat inappropriate comment, but there was no intention of retaliation.”
Afterwards, the appellate court found him guilty of seven out of eight violence-related crimes.
The court judged that most of the charges found guilty were credible because the victim’s statement was consistent and the statement matched records such as text messages and treatment details. On the other hand, regarding one assault charge that was judged not guilty, it was concluded that it was difficult to conclude that there was assault because the time and place of the act were unclear.
Regarding the charge of threats of retaliation, Mr. A was found guilty after admitting that he sent threatening text messages to the victim while mentioning words such as ‘police’ and ‘police station’, that each threatening act was made after reporting to 112, and that the victim had suffered from more than dozens of domestic violence, including assault, over a long period of time.
The court explained the reason for the reduced sentence, saying, “Considering the circumstances and methods of each crime in this case, the nature of the crime is quite bad and the possibility of criticism is high. The defendant has no history of criminal punishment exceeding a fine, and upon reaching the trial, he reached an agreement with the victim and submitted an agreement stating that the victim did not want to be punished by this court.”
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