Study looks at relationship between wealth and gravity of court sentence
A paper posted on the government's judiciary intranet site by a South Korean judge says that the level of punishment a criminal receives depends on how much money he or she has. According to Judge Seol Min-su of the Seoul Central District Court, he based his conclusion on a study of 114 court rulings meted out by a lower court for so-called white-collar economic crimes such as embezzlement and securities fraud. "The level of punishment in South Korea has a close relationship with whether the defendant and plaintiff reach an out-of-court agreement or whether the former is detained ahead of sentencing," Seol said. As an example, Seol cited the fact that a homeless with a trivial crime would be highly likely to be detained before sentencing, while a large firm's CEO, even if he or she committed a more serious crime, would be highly unlikely to be detained.The rich can also take advantage of their wealth in making a deal with a plaintiff, he added. "As such, detainment is determined by the defendant's social status, and if he or she is rich, nine out of 10 times an agreement with the plaintiff is made and punishment avoided." "In the case of tax evaders, only 7 percent of those persons received prison terms, in spite of the relatively serious nature of their crime," Seol said. According to Seol's paper, among the 114 people surveyed, 82 received prison terms and 32 were given suspended sentences. By occupation, nine percent of the unemployed defendents received suspended sentences, while the corresponding figures for the self-employed and office workers were 11.1 percent and 19 percent, respectively. By contrast, for company executives, the ratio surged to 33.3 percent, and as much as 83 percent of CEOs for companies whose sales exceeded 10 billion won were granted suspended sentences, Seol said. Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]
