Yongsan Ward office chief granted bail 5 months after being arrested over deadly crowd crush

Yongsan Ward office chief Park Hee-young enters the Seoul Western District Court for a hearing on whether to issue an arrest warrant in connection with an investigation into the bungled response to the deadly crowd crush in Itaewon neighborhood, Dec. 26, 2022. Yonhap

Park Hee-young, the chief of the Yongsan Ward office in Seoul, was granted bail Wednesday five months after she was arrested on charges of professional negligence related to the Itaewon crowd crush last year.

Park had been standing trial in detention on charges of shoddy emergency response and disaster prevention measures to the Oct. 29 crowd crush in Yongsan's Itaewon area which killed 159 people. She was arrested on Dec. 26.

The Seoul Western District Court on Wednesday granted Park's bail request on the conditions that she pays a bail deposit of 50 million won ($38,461) and she stays within a designated residence.

Park filed for bail again last month, saying she is struggling with mental disorders in the aftermath of the crowd crush after her initial bail request in January was dismissed. (Yonhap)