Record number of drug offenders booked in past 5 years; teens increase threefold
Drinks spiked with drugs are seen in this file photo, April 17. Courtesy of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency
Police booked a record number of drug offenders this year, with teenage suspects tripling over the past year, officials said Monday.
The National Police Agency said they have booked a total of 17,152 people on drug-related charges and formally arrested 2,379 of them during the intensive drug crackdown from March through November.
It marks the highest figure in the past five years and a 38.5 percent jump from the previous year.
Over half of the suspects were young people identified as teens or in their 20s and 30s, and the number of teenagers booked on drug charges tripled to 1,025, compared with 294 in the same period last year.
The number of drug convicts in their 60s also increased nearly twofold from 1,829 to 3,333 this year.
Most of the drug use took place at clubs or karaoke rooms, with a total of 672 people caught this year, nearly 3.6 times the rate since recordkeeping began in 2019.
Drug offenders selling or buying drugs on the internet grew by 41.1 percent compared with 2022, totaling 4,362 people, with those booked for using the dark web or virtual assets exceeding the 1,000 mark for the second consecutive year.
The number of foreign drug convicts leaped for the fourth consecutive year, recording 2,067 people this year, 17.6 percent higher than the year before.
Meanwhile, 66 people fled the country after being charged with illegal drug use, and 25 were repatriated to Korea, the data showed. (Yonhap)