Sex crime victims turned away from neighborhoods

A halfway house for victims of sex crimes which opened in a location in Seoul in 2002 keeps a low profile.

The small (83 square meters) and worn-down facility is basically home to 10 victims and four caretakers.

There is little space for any one of them and it is difficult to cook, eat and live but they are grateful that they have not been thrown out.

In reality, the shelter was offered a much larger facility by SH Engineering and Construction, a company run by the Seoul metropolitan government, but residents in the vicinity will not have any of it.

The wall papers were done and the curtains put up but the residents said they do not want sex crime victims living in their neighborhood.

“The existence of such a facility in the neighborhood is certain to bring down apartment prices. Who will take responsibility for that,” one resident argued.

Even as the victims were preparing to move into the new facility, scores of residents held demonstrations at the county ward office, protesting the accommodation of such a “distasteful” facility.