"Carried Weapon to Make Holes in Sign," No Action Taken

[Anchor]

Choi, the suspect in the random weapon attack, was investigated by police just a week before the crime on charges of carrying a weapon in a public place. However, the police did not even conduct a "risk assessment" to check for the possibility of it leading to a motiveless crime.

Reporter Kim Minjun has the details.

[Reporter]

Choi, a man in his 50s suspected in the weapon attack, told police that he received treatment for athlete's foot at a hospital in Incheon, but demanded settlement money after claiming his condition did not improve, which was rejected.

Harboring a grievance, he began a one-man protest on August 19. The hospital reported him to the police a total of six times: four times for spreading false information and obstructing business, and twice on September 9 for "carrying a weapon."

The weapon was actually found, and he was booked and investigated by the police on charges of "carrying a weapon in a public place," which occurred just one week before his stabbing rampage.

The crime of "carrying a weapon in a public place" was introduced in April of last year to prevent "motiveless crimes"—where unknown individuals harm random targets for inexplicable reasons, similar to the stabbing incidents at Sillim Station and Seohyun Station in 2023.

The law makes it punishable to carry or display a weapon in a public place without justifiable cause, and stipulates that if police determine through a checklist assessment that it could lead to a motiveless crime, measures such as arrest or emergency hospitalization should be taken.

However, in Choi's case, even the checklist assessment was not carried out. Police explained that at the time, Choi claimed he "used the weapon to make holes in his one-man protest sign," and no actions threatening nearby citizens were confirmed.

Neither the electronic anklet worn out of concern for reoffending, the Ministry of Justice's probation, nor the newly introduced public weapon-carrying law from last year prevented or stopped Choi's brutal crime.

[Bae Sang-hoon / Professor of Police and Criminal Psychology at Woosuk University: The investigative information of the police and the probation network of the Ministry of Justice are not compatible. If integrated, information such as electronic anklets and past criminal records could be combined to predict that the risk of carrying a weapon and committing a crime is high.]

Experts emphasized that to more clearly judge the purpose and risk of carrying a weapon, information sharing between relevant authorities must become smoother than it is now.

(Photo: Newsis / Video reporting: Kim Hangyul, Video editing: Kim Yoon-sung, Design: Seo Seung-hyun, Footage provided by Newsis)

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