With South Korea's new criminal justice system taking effect in one day, the police are entering an "emergency response system." Police will conduct overlapping reviews of case handling from local police stations up through provincial agencies and headquarters, and will recast their investigative approach by making the protection of crime victims the top principle of police investigations.
"Tomorrow our criminal justice system faces its biggest transformation in 78 years," Kim Jong-cheol, acting commissioner general of the Korean National Police Agency, said at a national meeting of police investigation commanders held on the afternoon of the 1st at police headquarters in Seoul's Seodaemun District. "Investigation and prosecution are being separated, and police have been given the weighty duty of protecting the rights and interests of the public even more firmly."
Kim declared that the police organization would operate under an emergency response system until the new criminal justice framework takes hold in the field. "From today, the police declare a shift to an 'emergency response system' until the new framework takes full root in the field," he said.
"So that not a single victim is wronged and not even the smallest gap appears, we will conduct overlapping reviews of case handling from local police stations up through provincial agencies and headquarters, and correct problems immediately," he said. "We will make sure outcomes do not vary depending on the police office or the investigator in charge."
The focus of police investigations will also be aligned with victim protection. "Along with uncovering the substantive truth, police will recast the paradigm of police investigations with 'the protection of crime victims as the first principle of investigation,'" Kim said. "From the moment a report is received to the moment a case is closed, the question police ask themselves will be 'the safety of the victim,' and the eyes of the police will always be turned toward the victim."
He signaled tougher sanctions for corruption and misconduct in the investigative process. "For serious misconduct such as corruption, fabricating or covering up cases, and shielding our own, we will hold officers more strictly accountable, with removal from service as the standard disciplinary measure," Kim said.
He also pledged support for front-line investigators. "We will ensure that expertise built up in investigative units is properly recognized and that the longer officers devote themselves, the more rewarding they find it," Kim said. "Commanders will always stand alongside investigators facing difficult judgments."
"Starting tomorrow, our 140,000 officers will give their all so that every case handled at police offices nationwide leads to the belief that it was the right choice to entrust it to the police," Kim said. "Please watch as the police turn the voices of the public into change on the ground."
About 650 commanding officers attended the meeting, including heads of investigative units at the rank of senior superintendent or above from provincial police agencies nationwide and police station chiefs.
