A former prison officer who collected money and valuables in exchange for various conveniences such ..

A former prison officer who collected money and valuables in exchange for various conveniences such as using mobile phones and making external calls to inmates was sentenced to probation of prison.

On the 27th, the Suwon District Court’s Criminal Department 14 (Chief Judge Yoon Sung-yeol) sentenced a former prison guard A, who was indicted on charges of fraud after taking over, execution of his sentence, and violation of the law on the treatment of prisoners, to one and a half years in prison and three years of probation. The court ordered a fine of 3 million won and a fine of 3.6 million won and imposed 120 hours of community service.

Four inmates, including B, who were handed over to trial on charges of bribing A, were fined 1 million won to 2 million won, respectively, depending on the degree of participation.

A was charged with providing various preferential treatment, including receiving a total of 3.6 million won worth of money and valuables from inmates from July to November 2023 and having them use mobile phones that were secretly brought into the detention center.

It was investigated that the crime began with the request of an inmate B, who was close to him in the past. Mr. A was found to have received a set of Korean beef worth 200,000 won from Mr. B, asking him to “make it possible to talk to the outside wife and use the bath facilities often.” Since then, he/she has provided convenience so that B can talk to his/her girlfriend outside from time to time using his/her mobile phone.

He first provided preferential treatment to other inmates and then asked for money and valuables. A was found to have requested a used smartphone worth 1 million won after providing convenience to prisoner C, such as allowing him to make frequent external calls or calling him to a separate room to drink coffee.

Afterwards, it was confirmed that he first offered C through B, “If you give me 700,000 won a month, I will let you use your mobile phone freely,” and then received the money through a borrowed account.

It was investigated that related documents were also falsely made up for the inmate’s phone use. Mr. A is also accused of filling out documents and pocketing 700,000 won as if the two were in a common-law relationship so that prisoner D could talk to his girlfriend using a phone call from an inmate to his family.

Another inmate, E, was found to have received 1 million won, along with a request to “look at the convenience of his imprisoned acquaintance.” In the process, A received money from an acquaintance’s account to hide the criminal proceeds.

The court judged that the nature of the crime was not good in that the prison guard not only received bribes from inmates and provided unfair convenience, but also brought electronic devices prohibited from being brought into correctional facilities and concealed criminal profits.

In particular, he pointed out that there is a high possibility of criticism because it greatly undermined social trust in the fairness of prison officers’ job execution.

The court explained, “We sentenced the suspension of execution in consideration of the fact that A admitted and reflected on all the crimes, had no previous history of criminal punishment, lost his position as a prison guard due to dismissal in this case, and relatively little bribe.”