'Heather Cho still has no sense of guilt'

Ex-Korean Air executive gets one year in jail for ‘nut rage’

By Kim Rahn

Heather Cho

By Kim Rahn

• Published Feb 12, 2015 7:43 PM KST
• Updated Feb 12, 2015 7:43 PM KST

Former Korean Air executive Heather Cho submitted letters of apology to a presiding judge for the “nut rage” scandal six times in the lead-up to Thursday’s ruling in an apparent bid to beg for leniency.

Sentencing her to one year in prison, Seoul Western District Court Judge Oh Sung-woo said he did not recognize the “sincerity” of the letters, saying he doubted whether she has a sense of guilt about her behavior.

“I wonder whether she really thinks she was wrong,” Oh said in the verdict.

The one-year prison term was lighter than the prosecution’s demand for three years.

The court ruled that she forced a flight from JFK International Airport in New York to change its course, dismissing her lawyers’ claim that it was not a course change. It was the first time in Korea that the charge has been recognized.

The court also ruled her guilty of committing acts of violence that disturbed flight safety, coercion and interfering with business.

Cho was indicted and jailed after she ordered a flight bound for Incheon to return to the gate from a taxiing area at JFK Dec. 5 and kicked a chief flight attendant, Park Chang-jin, off the plane as she was dissatisfied with the way a junior attendant served her macadamia nuts ― in a bag and not on a plate.

“It is reasonable to regard not only air route but also ground movement as a flight’s course,” the court said, dismissing the claim that a flight’s course only meant an air route existing 200 meters above the ground. “We recognize the flight’s planned course was changed.”

Regarding Cho’s claim that she was not aware that the plane started moving, the court said she was, because the in-flight announcement and seat belt signs showed the plane would be moving. “When Park told her that the plane already started, she told him to stop it. So she was aware of it,” the court said.

It said her behavior delayed the plane’s departure for 24 minutes, interfered with other planes’ operations at the airport, and created the possibility of a collision with other flights. “Although she had the right to exclude a crewmember from duty as a company executive, such a right should have been exercised according to due procedure before a flight. Kicking the attendant off the plane was beyond her authority.”

The court said the pilot’s decision to return to the gate was on Cho’s orders rather than his own judgment.

“This incident may not have happened if she did not regard employees as slaves and could control her temper,” it said. “It is a serious case that put passengers’ safety at risk.”

In deciding the jail term, the court said it considered the fact that the incident did not cause an accident; that Cho generally admitted her acts; she was a first-time offender; she has 20-month-old twin boys; and Korean Air said it would guarantee Park and other crewmembers could continue working at the firm without problems.

The court did not recognize the charge that she interfered with the transport authority’s official duties by making another company executive meddle in the investigation, citing a lack of clear evidence.

The executive, Yeo Woon-jin, was sentenced to eight months in prison for attempting to cover up the incident and destroying evidence during the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport’s investigation by forcing Park and other witnesses to lie to investigators.

A former ministry official, Kim Woon-sub, received a suspended one-year jail term for giving detailed information about the ministry’s investigation to Yeo.

Cho’s lawyers said they would consider an appeal. Regarding the ruling, Korean Air did not make any comment.