By Kim Se-jeong
The Supreme Court’s decision Friday to uphold a death sentence imposed on a convicted murderer has reignited the debate on abolishing capital punishment in Korea.
The death penalty has not been carried out here since December 30 1997, when 18 men and five women were hanged in one night.
Calls are mounting to take the death penalty off the statute books because it is seen as ineffective in preventing crimes.
The Supreme Court upheld an appeals court verdict on a man who killed the parents of his ex-girlfriend.
This was the first time that the death penalty has been upheld in two years.
The man, surnamed Jang, 25, disguised himself as a plumber to enter the apartment of the woman’s parents in Daegu in May last year. He killed the parents, then confined and raped his ex-girlfriend who arrived home later the same day. She escaped by jumping out of a window of the apartment on the fourth floor, sustaining hip injuries.
Jang’s sentencing means the number of inmates on death row is now 61.
Confirming the sentence, the court said that Jang deserved harsh punishment because the murder was premeditated and the method of killing was cruel.
But in the ruling, it raised questions about the effectiveness of capital punishment.
“We know the debate about abolishing the death penalty is gaining momentum and a bill for the abolishment of the death penalty is pending at the National Assembly,” it said in the ruling. “Yet, the Assembly has not made a decision about the issue, and the Constitutional Court ruled in favor of it in 2010. So the court has no option other than to confirm the death penalty for crimes that warrant it.”
While the issue has long been controversial, calls to abolish the death penalty have become stronger than those to keep it.
In the 2010 ruling, five justices of the Constitutional Court ruled that the penalty was constitutional, down from seven in 1996.
On Thursday, Supreme Court justice nominee Lee Ki-taek said, “I hope capital punishment will be scrapped and we come up with an alternative.”
Lawmakers have also sought to abolish it.
In July, Rep. Yoo Ihn-tae of the main opposition New Politics for Democracy (NPAD) party submitted a bill to abolish the death penalty.
This is the Assembly’s seventh attempt, and the bill was signed by 171 lawmakers from both the ruling and opposition parties. The bill is currently under review at the Legislative and Judiciary Committee.
Kim Hee-jin from the Korean chapter of Amnesty International said chances of passing the bill are higher this time than before. “Support for the bill is stronger this time,” Kim said.
Amnesty International is among the proponents of abolishing the death penalty, arguing that human life should be respected no matter what a person does.
But those wanting to keep capital punishment argue that harsh laws are still needed to maintain social order.
“Not all people are good and we need a system to handle them,” Rep. Park Min-shik of the ruling Saenuri Party wrote on his blog. “Also, do you know how much taxpayers’ money is spent keeping them alive? I think we have better ways to spend that money.”