Man convicted of masturbating next to sleeping woman

By Park Si-soo

A man has been found guilty of masturbating next to a sleeping woman at a house he had broken into.

Jeju Provincial Court sentenced the man, 33, to three years in prison. But it suspended the term for five years, meaning if he does not reoffend within that time, his jail term will be considered fulfilled.

The court also put him on three years' probation and ordered him to fulfill 80 hours of community services and receive 40 hours of sex crime education.

According to court documents, the man, surnamed Kim, a delivery man at a Chinese restaurant, broke into a house in Yongdam-dong at 3:30 a.m. on June 5. He found a sleeping woman, lay next to her, took off his pants and masturbated.

The woman woke and screamed, also waking her husband.

Prosecutors charged the man with housebreaking and attempted rape. The court rejected the attempted rape charge, saying there was no evidence of this.

The court said there was “no physical contact between the man and woman.”

“The man and woman talked and reached an agreement to settle the case peacefully,” a court official said. “The woman asked the court not to impose a punishment on him. The man had no convictions for any sexual crime.”