Written by: Anushka Basnet - 24001, Grade X
Posted on: 10 May, 2021
On 11th of December in 2008, a 8 year old girl Na Young (fictional name) was raped by a 56 year old male Cho Doo-Soon. This incident took place in Ansan, South Korea. What's more to this case is that the old man raped the girl by luring her into a public bathroom so brutally, she is left with permanent damages in her internal organs, traumatic cuts in the abdomen, lower abdomen and pelvis. She was told that she had to live with a colostomy bag for the rest of life but after successful surgery Na-Young lives with an artificial anus. She suffered from severe depression and mental stress. Na-young who was just an 8 year old then, was kept upright with her colostomy bag to testify the incident which led to more physical and mental problems. It was almost as if the police were neglecting the incident and wanted to get over it as soon as possible.
So what happened to Cho doo-soon? He was originally sentenced to life imprisonment but later the court decided that “Because he was intoxicated at the time the incident took place, he was unaware of his actions'' his sentence was reduced to only 12 years in prison. As of today, Cho Doo-Soon is roaming freely around the earth. Cho Doo-Soon had committed various other crimes before this which included several rape cases and even death of a 60 year old man but he never recieved any kind of justified punishment and the reason for it was “intoxication”. In South Korea, if a person commits crime while intoxicated (Under the influence of alcohol or drugs, or if they have mental illness), the sentence will be reduced as the person would not be fully aware of what they are doing. This law is what made Cho Doo-Soon get away with the crimes he commited. His only family in this world is his wife who does nothing but praise him. She says that Cho Doo-Soon is a really polite person and the only reason he committed those crimes is because of alcohol. She says that he never vented anger on her, and always respected her. He may be a really polite person with his wife but that doesn't give him any right to commit these crimes. Now Cho Doo-Soon is roaming around free in Ansan where the girl he raped and her family also lives. Na Young has to live in the same neighbourhood as her rapist. Na Young who is now 20 years old watches only cartoons and avoids news completely to avoid any possible chance of seeing something sexual assault related. Petition for life imprisonment had been going around for long enough but the blue house of South Korea did not give any further sentence of imprisonment for Cho Doo-Soon. The person who committed so many crimes but blamed it all on alcohol walking around freely is something that terrifies me. I believe that such a person should never be walking around with the public freely acting as if they did nothing wrong. Death or life imprisonment is too little of a punishment for such people.
