By Kang Shin-who
Staff Reporter
A growing number of women are victims of sexual crimes in the subway. According to the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, the number of sex crimes committed in subways has increased by 12 percent over the last few years.
Also, a recent survey on 1,360 women by the local broadcaster KBS showed more than 40 percent of them experienced sexual dishonor in the subway and 24.6 percent said they were sexually harassed.
Especially, summer is the most loathed season for victims of sex harassment and the offenders vary from juveniles to the elderly.
One such example involves Han, a 25-year-old woman from Goyang City, Gyeonggi Province.
While Han was on the way to work by subway, she felt an old man was persistently gazing at her breast. She was very uncomfortable and muttered to herself ``Why is he looking at me.''
Suddenly, the man came and stroked her with his fist saying that she was the one looking at him. Han attempted to run away yelling, but the man continued to follow her. Han barely managed to call police and eventually sued him, but the old man counter-sued Han on a charge of violence insisting that Han violated him.
``The experience is traumatic for me. I still cannot sleep well nowadays. No matter how much I think about it, I am very angry and distressed,'' Han said.
Park Ji-young, 28, is another victim of sexual harassment. When Park was on her way to school in a congested subway train, she felt somebody grope her buttocks and other parts of her body.
Park was frightened but unable to do anything at the time.
``I have heard about sex crimes in the subway but it was my first time to go through the experience. Since then, I became very reluctant to ride on crowded subway trains,'' said Park, a graduate student at Ewha Womans University.
Korea Sexual Violence Relief Center advised that women need to yell out and warn sexual offenders saying `I will report you to the police' as soon as they face sexual harassment.
``It is very hard to predict sexual harassment. So there is little we can do to prevent the crime except to counsel harassed women and develop education programs for possible offenders,'' said Kim Yeon-seok, a counselor of the center.
Current law imposes a maximum one-year prison term or a fine of 3 million won on a person who committees a sexual crime in public.