Warning Text After Sexual Assault and Stalking? Police Investigation Reaches National Office of Investigation

[Anchor]

The police investigation into allegations of botched handling of the Jang Yoon-gi case is expanding beyond Gwangju Gwangsan Police Station to its highest peak, the National Office of Investigation. Circumstances are successively coming to light that just two days before Jang Yoon-gi murdered a female high school student, the Gwangsan Police Station responded inadequately to a stalking report.

Reported by Im Jihyeon.

[Reporter]

The National Police Agency's special investigation team summoned and questioned Superintendent Kim, the former chief of the Gwangju Gwangsan Police Station who directed the initial investigation at the time of the Jang Yoon-gi case, as a suspect this morning (July 23).

Superintendent Kim is suspected of exerting undue influence in the process of applying charges of simple murder rather than murder with intent to commit rape against Jang Yoon-gi.

The special investigation team is focusing on how the stalking case reported by a Vietnamese woman, identified as A, was handled two days before Jang Yoon-gi murdered the late Lee Chae-won.

Previously, Jang Yoon-gi was suspected of breaking into A's studio apartment, sexually assaulting her, and then stalking her.

When A reported the stalking at around 8:00 PM on May 3, officers from the Cheomdan District Unit of the Gwangsan Police Station who were dispatched to the scene merely sent a single warning text message to Jang Yoon-gi without even booking him.

After receiving the stalking warning message, Jang Yoon-gi threw his mobile phone's USIM chip into the Yeongsan River and subsequently committed the murder.

Although this is crucial evidence to support Jang Yoon-gi's charge of murder during a rape, the Gwangsan Police Station assigned the case to the Women and Youth Division to investigate it separately.

The special investigation team suspects that the Gwangsan Police Station leadership, including Superintendent Kim, attempted to sever the connection between the murder and the stalking crimes out of concern over disciplinary action resulting from their poor response to the stalking.

The suspicion that the National Office of Investigation ordered the Gwangsan Police Station to conduct separate investigations into Jang Yoon-gi is also a subject of investigation.

The special investigation team summoned two employees from the National Office of Investigation, including the head of the Violent Crimes Investigation Section and a staff member from the same department, as reference witnesses for questioning today. It is reported that Park Sung-ju, the head of the National Office of Investigation at the time, is not yet included among the targets of the investigation.

(Video by Park Ji-in | Graphics by Kim Ye-ji)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.