flood: A South Korean court has convicted three former police officers of destroying internal files and other evidence in an attempt to cover up after a Halloween mob crush that killed nearly 160 people in the capital, Seoul, in 2022.
These are the first convictions over the deaths, which involved two Australians, Sydney social worker Justina Chu, 28, and film producer Grace Rashid, 23.
Nathan Tavernetti (left) and Grace Rashid (right) before thrashing Itaewon fans.credit: Nathan Tarfiniti
The high death toll has been blamed largely on official failures in disaster planning and botched emergency response. More than 20 government and police officials have been charged.
The Seoul Western District Court sentenced Park Seung-min, a former senior intelligence officer at the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, to 18 months in prison on charges that he ordered his subordinates to erase internal documents after the stampede. These included reports showing how police ignored warnings about potential crowd-related incidents in the Itaewon nightlife district.
Kim Jin-ho, a former intelligence officer at Yongsan District Police Station in Seoul, was given a one-year suspended prison sentence on similar charges. Kwang Young-seok, a lower-ranking officer at Yongsan Station, received a four-month deferred sentence after being found guilty of destroying files under Kim's instructions.
South Korean police officers stand guard at the scene of an accident in Seoul in 2022.credit: AP
A civic group representing the victims' families issued a statement welcoming the ruling, which they said recognizes “the criminal liability of public officials for failing to anticipate and prepare for the huge crowd that led to the tragedy, and for covering up and downplaying information about the tragedy.” “After it happened.”
Australian fashion designer Nathan Tavernity, who was with Cho and Rashid in the stampede, accused the South Korean government of negligence. “I was there from start to finish. The government knew 100 per cent that this was happening. I waited two hours before emergency services arrived,” he said in November 2022.
The group also criticized South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol for vetoing a bill last month that would have appointed a private investigator to lead an independent investigation into the incident. After a 74-day investigation into the tragedy, a special investigation team led by the National Police Agency concluded that police and municipal officials in Yongsan District failed to plan effective crowd control measures.
