Asian Junkie Asian pop. Without discretion.
Things have been quiet on the Hara domestic incident front for a while now, but it’s been revealed that police may investigate Hara for bodily harm instead of assault, which means that even if they end up settling they can still prosecute.
The Gangnam Police Station in Seoul, which is in charge of the case, reported that they are considering investigating Goo Hara for the suspicion of causing bodily injury. According to reports, the police made the decision after checking the condition of the boyfriend’s face at the time of attendance. “A” had released a three-week medical report saying Goo Hara scratched his face. If she is charged with causing bodily injury and not assault, Goo Hara must be examined by the prosecution, and even if “A” declares that he intends to drop charges, she can still face criminal punishment. Since bodily injury is a crime that can still be punishable even if the victim states that they don’t want the perpetrator to be punished, this means that the case cannot be settled by withdrawing the suit. The police will decide on a charge to apply to “A” by questioning the degree of the damage and the possibility of recovery for Goo Hara. The police also said they will summon the two again soon and plan to conduct a cross-examination as they have mixed statements.
Emphasis mine.
As explained before, Korea’s self-defense can be a murky situation, and one quirk in particular now seems relevant to this situation.
Under the law, people are allowed to use force to “prevent unjust infringement of one’s or another person’s legal interest,” as long as there are reasonable grounds for that act and the degree of force does not go beyond reasonable bounds. But the law, as precedents and police guidelines show, deems using weapons and inflicting injuries on the attacker that would take more than three weeks to recover from unreasonable ― a standard many find almost impossible to meet in reality.
Emphasis mine.
Remember when everybody was making fun of the ex for going around to interviews with an IV and having to be admitted to the hospital for scratches? Well that stuff makes a lot more sense now. Credit to one Asian Junkie commenter who pointed it out in the midst of people making jokes about the ridiculousness of the picture, because that time being the cutoff to nix any self-defense justification seems to have played a key role in proceedings. I thought they were just being pedantic by wanting that detail included, but seems like they were right. Oops.
Honestly though, this isn’t much of an update. It’s just police saying that they could possibly investigate Hara for a certain charge and that they haven’t decided on what to charge her ex with yet. So it doesn’t change anything about the situation, but I thought it was worth bringing up a point that somebody had told me to include before as it now seems very relevant.
