"Handle Sexual Assault Case Quietly": Former National Office of Investigation Head Indicted

[Anchor]

Regarding allegations of a cover-up in the Jang Yoon-ki case, the prosecution has indicted four high-ranking police officials, including former National Office of Investigation Head Park Sung-joo. The prosecution concluded that Park, fearing public backlash over botched initial handling, ordered the sexual assault case to be investigated separately from the murder case under the instruction to "handle the sexual assault quietly."

First, here is a report by reporter Kim su-yun.

[Reporter]

The Gwangju District Prosecutors' Office announced that it has indicted former National Office of Investigation Head Park Sung-joo without detention on charges of abuse of power.

He is accused of improperly ordering the police to separately investigate the foreign woman stalking and sexual crime and the high school girl murder case committed by Jang Yoon-ki.

The prosecution stated that two months before the Jang Yoon-ki incident, in March, public criticism against the police had surged due to cases like the Namyangju stalking murder. Park allegedly worried that if it came to light that Jang's stalking and sexual crime led to the high school girl's murder, criticism over poor response would intensify.

[Shin Tae-hoon / Deputy Chief Prosecutor, Gwangju District Prosecutors' Office: "Saying 'Let's handle the rape quietly,' and 'We aren't intentionally hiding it, but there's no need for us to bring it up first,' he told them to have different investigative units handle the stalking and rape case and the murder case separately..."]

It was also revealed that officials at the National Office of Investigation followed Park's instructions and rejected a request from the Gwangsan Police Station's investigation team to merge the investigations.

The prosecution indicted three other officials from the National Office of Investigation without detention alongside former Head Park, including the acting head of the violent crimes investigation division.

The prosecution stated that due to Park's improper intervention in the investigation, the Gwangsan Police Station investigation team failed to properly uncover the murder motive and the sexual crime intent, ultimately forwarding Jang on mere murder charges.

In response, former Head Park stated, "It was a completely normal and routine operational directive," adding, "I cannot acknowledge or accept such unfair logical framing that I ordered separate investigations to evade public criticism and prevented necessary investigations from being properly conducted."

(Video reporting: Jung Kyoung-mun | Video editing: Yoo Mi-ra | Design: Lee Ga-jin)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.