By Kim Rahn
A special patrol unit will hunt down gropers and other sexual criminals on subways.
The city government said Thursday that it will dispatch a total of 171 “subway sheriffs” to various subway stations by 2012 aiming to prevent sexual crimes committed on the public transportation.
The measure comes as sexual crimes on subways have increased a lot in recent years, with the number of offenders rising to 1,192 in 2010 from 671 in 2009, while other types of crime have decreased.
“Those sheriffs will wear plain clothes during the morning rush hour, mingling with commuters, so that they can’t be identified. They will mainly work on platforms but when seeing a suspicious person, they will board the train to catch him red-handed if he acts strangely,” a city official said.
After the morning rush hour and before the subway operation finishes at around 1 a.m., they will wear uniforms while patrolling stations, cracking down not only sexual violence but also other activities such as disturbing public order and drinking or smoking on subway trains.
Each sheriff will be equipped with an extendible baton and a digital camera.
The city recently selected 75 sheriffs, including three women. Half of them are former policemen, soldiers, or bodyguards, the city official said.
They will start work in October after training, and 75 more will be hired next year.
“The police unit responsible for subway transport only employs 104 policemen. Among the total 292 stations, they are dispatched to 16 stations where crimes frequently occur. The sheriffs are expected to complement the unit’s duties,” he said.
Besides the sheriff project, the city will also install surveillance cameras inside all subway trains by 2012 to use the recordings as evidence for crimes. Two cameras will be set up within each compartment.
To minimize controversy over privacy infringement by the cameras, station enmployees or subway engineers will not watch the entire camera recordings but will only use them after an incident.
“We’ll also put notices inside train cars that surveillance cameras are in operation,” the official said.
rahnita@koreatimes.co.kr
