Infamous 2002 & 1994

Subway Incidents

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"We are sorting out details and collecting evidence to discover the truth. We plan to summon the soldiers again in the coming days, " Paek Doo-hyun, a police inspector in charge of the case, told The Korea Times. "But we are having difficulties, as the soldiers reject making any statements unfavorable to themselves."

and

A prosecution official said it had been proven that Seo repeatedly punched Murphy in the face first, and that the private was kidnapped and forcibly detained by the students, therefore invalidating any claims made by the South Koreans

The facts on the 2002 Incident:

3 US soldiers and a group of university student activists (and one elder leader) promoting a large anti-US/USFK rally were involved in a big brawl on the subway in Seoul.

1 GI was held captive by the students and forced to participate in the rally and write out a "confession" against himself for the subway incident and write statements against USFK concerning the recent tank accident.

The Korean police eventually concluded the elder leader had started the fight when he struck the soldier in the face prompting both the soldier and students to go at it.

But, the elder leader was not charged with a crime nor were any of the students.

The Story:

The lack of American media attention to this story directly led to the creation of this site. 

For over a month, as things in Korea grew increasingly out of control, I had been sending articles, images, and links to a growing number of US media outlets hoping they would get a clue.  --- They didn't.

Page 1

When this event happened, I thought, "Now, they can't ignore this!"

I was wrong.

Only 2 stories came out about it: 1 each for the NY and LA Times

In Korea, for a couple of days, the media did as they always do -- rant about putting the GI criminals in jail, but when the NY Times reported the event, Korea turtled.

Here is the elder leader's first version of the events as quoted in the Korea Herald --

"We were distributing pamphlets about the deaths of the schoolgirls. After the soldiers threw away the pamphlets they were given, and I scolded them for disrespecting our activities, a soldier suddenly started throwing punches at me," Suh told reporters after being sent to a hospital.

The latest incident involving U.S. troops has further enraged the Korean civic organizations that have been demanding that the U.S. military relinquish its jurisdiction over those involved in the girls' deaths.

When the train stopped at a station near Kyung Hee University, where the rally was being held, angry students seized one of the servicemen and later handed him over to the police.

2 to 4 hours later!!

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About 6,000 students and civil rights activists attended the rally in memory of the two girls who were crushed to death by an armored vehicle from the U.S. 2nd Infantry Division on a narrow country road north of Seoul.

The elder leader in question was popular at most of the anti-US/USFK rallies in 2002 and 2001 - on everything from the deal to purchase American-made F-15 fighter planes to the tank accident.

He was also an ex-National Assembly politician but was kicked out of office for illegal visits to Pyongyang and pro-NK activity.

His nose is broken. He has nasty bruises under both eyes. He says he has trouble hearing. He said he had a fractured eye socket, too, but doctors say he doesn't. And his voice is strong as he defends the behavior of Korean activists on that night. "If they had not dragged away the American who punched him," Mr. Suh said, "That would have been the last we saw of him."

This is the SOFA argument - that US soldiers who commit crimes in Korea go unpunished and simply fly back to America.

Virtually all of my adult students over the years have agreed with this assessment.

It is the common knowledge of Korean society - not some myth only the radical America-haters believe - though it is certainly a myth.

The truth is GIs have been routinely convicted in a Korean civilian criminal court going back to 1967.

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I saw this happen again and again for crimes as horrible as murder to theft of a notebook computer to simple assault.

That is what makes the GI Crimes Myth so frustrating. 

Time and time again, when the issue came up (always brought up by the students), I would ask them for examples of the GI crimes that go unpunished --

-- and time and time again they named the same high profile incidents - and time and time again, I'd end up beating my head against the wall --

-- because I had learned, by watching the news or researching their archives, that each one of these crimes had, in point of clear fact, led to GI convictions and jail time at the hands of Korean authorities.

These students of mine were thus proving themselves wrong, but I could never get them to understand it.

It was simply a mind-block issue:

They didn't want to know the truth - because the GI Crimes Myth was a key building block in the justification of Korean "righteous rage" against US "interference" in Korean society and a booster for Korean nationalism.

Back to this example, here is how the Stars and Stripes reported the event:

Suh said Murphy shunned the flyer (advertising the anti-US rally and written in Korean which he could not read), and when Suh asked him what

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country he was from, Murphy replied, “You don’t have to worry where I’m from.” Suh said Murphy then cursed at him.

After asking Murphy why he was cursing, Suh said he sat down on a subway bench across from Murphy.

You hear "he cursed me" mentioned in many of the GI street fight stories, because in Korean society, it justifies the "righteous rage" at having your honor or pride hurt, especially by a younger person to an older one.

Murphy then approached him, Suh said, and Suh defensively put his arms up. That’s when Murphy punched him up to 10 times, Suh said. Three or four other subway riders then grabbed Murphy, Suh said.

In another account, Kim (a spokesman for the anti-US group) said that Murphy punched when Suh approached him the second time and put his hand on Murphy’s lips to stop his cursing.

Suh maintains he touched Murphy only after the punching began, to try to stop him.

Here is Suh talking to the Joongang Ilbo --

As he rode the subway from his home in Mapo to Kyung Hee University, Mr. Suh said, he saw three men in civilian clothes, but he had no way of knowing that they were American soldiers.

Your bullshit meter should be going off right about now.

It isn't hard to spot US soldiers:  crew cuts, young age, and not being Korean.

Sometimes short haired English teachers are mistaken for soldiers, but the assumption is such a person is a member of USFK -- not the other way around.

Notice too that Suh is somehow disconnected from the protest and the group of students promoting it.  He was simply coming from his home on his way to the university.

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A group of activists on their way to a rally was passing out leaflets protesting an accident in June when a U.S. Army vehicle ran over two teenage girls. The activists offered leaflets to Private Murphy, who was saying words that, younger passengers told Mr. Suh, were obscene curses. "I asked the person sitting near me and he said it was something he could not repeat," he said.

As the invective continued, Mr. Suh got up, walked over to the Americans, stood in front of Private Murphy and asked -- in Korean, not knowing if it would be understood -- what he was saying. "I said, 'Obviously you are saying something about the leaflets, and I want to know what it is.'" Mr. Suh repeated his question "five times," when Private Murphy, according to Mr. Suh, abruptly stood up.

The abruptness led Mr. Suh to put a hand in front of him, "because, when you have a person jumping right up in front of you, it is almost a reflex." There was physical contact, Mr. Suh said, and the next he remembers he was being punched by Private Murphy, "left, right and center."

As with The Irish Incident, the Korean man should get his story down before he starts repeating it to different news outlets, because it keeps coming back different.

Now, we have Suh admitting he "made contact" with the GI's face before the punches came in response.....And the idea he was just putting his hand across the soldier's mouth to stop his cursing is gone.  Here, it is just an accidental contact and perhaps as a way to defend himself.

Private Murphy and the other soldiers, Private Eric Owens and Private Shane Tucker, broke away and got off the subway, but were confronted by "a crowd of some 200 demonstrators," some of whom "punched, kicked and spat upon" the three Americans, according to the army statement.

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Private Murphy was taken (note no time reference) to the Kyung Hee Medical Center, where a video recording was made of him apologizing to Mr. Suh.

Click here to see the version of the video I edited.

This video was taken down not long after Stars and Stripes wrote about it and provided a link address in the article - and after the US Embassy and USFK leaders were furiously protesting the event. 

Luckily, I had already downloaded it. 

All I edited out was a long Korean-language interview with Suh which the Stars and Stripes adequately reported which I quote in this review.

My Korean wife laughed out loud listening to the interview.  She said  even a brain dead average Korean would understand Suh was admitting he started the fight by slapping or punching the GI in the face.

In it, he gave another version of events:  this time, he approached the soldier because he wanted to get between the GI and the student activists who were starting to "scuffle."

The following was the Joongang Ilbo's rather distorted version of what the video shows:

The video footage was taken by the Voice of People, an activist group with anti-American leanings. It also showed Private Owens and Private Tucker being chased and captured by Korean riot police. The three men appeared obviously shaken in the footage.

Good Grief!!                          

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The police were not "chasing" the GI criminals!

They were trying to get them away from the mob to the safety of a nearby hospital.

As it happened, over a hundred riot police were stationed there, because a few days before, student radicals had taken over and laid siege to the lobby to show solidarity with striking nurses.

This was clear from the video - and there weren't 3 GIs but only 2.  Those two did look shaken when they got behind the wall of riot shields - as they started asking the Koreans who had just saved their asses where their friends was - saying again and again that he had on a yellow shirt.

Here is the Korea Times initial coverage --

An elderly lawmaker-turned-activist is in the hospital with his nose broken and eyes bruised after being assaulted Saturday by a U.S. soldier in Seoul.

Police said Suh Kyong-won, 65, was punched in the face during a subway train fracas between a group of college students and three U.S. soldiers in civilian clothes.

Again, selective reporting - as I noted earlier - Suh was a well-known anti-US/USFK civic group leader who helped stage countless protest rallies year to year.  He was also well-known for being an apologist for North Korea's tyranny and supporter of Pyongyang.  But, in order to keep the focus on the GI criminals, these details are omitted.

(Image:  kids reading an anti-US/USFK leaflet distributed at one of the frequent street campaigns)

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Next is what a college sophomore eye witness told Ohmynews -- I translated it, so it's a little awkward

(Ohmy(Gosh)news was part of a trend in Korea. It is a "citizen reporter" site that gained official sanction from Pres. Roh - a "progressive" former human rights lawyer who won a close election in Dec. 2002 when his anti-USFK/US credentials pushed him over the top)

The web design software I am using doesn't allow Korean fonts, so I have omitted the Korean script version --

US soldiers assaulted the representative adviser of the anti-US group "???" on the subway, and the offending soldier "should be placed in Korean court".
..........
(Caption for the photo of Suh I placed earlier in this review.)

As a result of the US soldier's sudden assault, Adviser Seo (Suh) Kyong-Won was bruised and black and blue around both eyes.

(Story continues) The assault happened while a representative of the anti-American group was questioning him about USFK's responsibility for the sacrifice of the two middle school girls.
.............

(Note - the bold was in the original script. I added only the red lettering.)

In particular, this soldier was from the Camp Red Cloud unit responsible for the death of the 2 middle school girls, and Korea has on going doubts after the sincerity of USFK's reflection over the death of the two middle school girls.

Also, we will watch how the Korean government handles the offender in light of the tank incident and because the subway fight did not happen while on official duty.

According to the statement by eye witness Hwang Jong-Uk, a 21 year old sophomore at Hanyang U. Ansna Campus, the incident occurred on the 14th at 5:30 in the afternoon on Seoul subway line number 1.

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Some university students were on the subway handing out flyers to promote a memorial festival being held that night at 6 at the open air stadium at Kyonghee Univ. While this was going on, there were 3 GIs on the subway that the group tried to ask to read the printed material connected with the death of the two middle school girls.

However, the GIs pulled away from accepting the printed material and started cussing them severely.

At the same time, So Kyong-Won, who is a standing adviser to the People's Council for Reconciliation, Independence, and Unification and former member of the National Assembly, was on the scene watching what was going on, and he asked the GIs, "Why are you throwing abusive language at the university students?" and "It was the soldier's fault the two middle school girls were killed," and he brushed the GI John Murphy (aged 22) on the cheek. At that second, John Murphy punched Adviser Seo's face, who was wearing glasses at the time, reported witness Hwang Jong-Uk.

Having been assaulted without warning/unexpectedly by the GI, Adviser Seo was quickly transferred to the nearby emergency room of the Kyonghee University medical facility, and the three GIs were seized by 4 university students and drug to the front gate of Kyonghee University. During the middle of this, 2 of them were handed over to the police in front of the main gate at KHU, but the man who assaulted Adviser Seo, John Murphy, was drug to the emergency room of the KHU medical facility.

As the video shows, this is utter, complete bullshit. 

The 2 were not "handed over" - they were saved by the riot police stationed at the subway stop.  The video clearly shows the student activists highly pissed off that the police won't let them get their hands on the 2 as they do the typical "shield ramming" that is part of Korea's protest culture.

After John Murphy was drug to the emergency room of the KHU medical facility, he drew up (??a confession??) saying "A different person hit me first and being afraid I hit adviser Seo," and he refuted that the attack was a deliberate act - not an action of self-defense."      

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In the video, you see a familiar face from the many, many anti-US protests of 2000-2003 - it is a "citizen reporter" for one of the hate groups.  He tries to coach Murphy into saying he started the fight, but the GI refuses.

You will also notice that the leaders of the riot police are helping to stage this "apology" - because they wanted to appease the large radical activist mob.

But Hwang Jong-Uk who witnessed the event made clear, "The victim touched the assailant's face, the assailant stared at him and right away punched him directly in the face," and "What John Murphy said isn't true."

The assailant John Murphy looked at Adviser Seo Jyong-Won and said "Very Sorry. But I was afraid and began throwing punches without doing anything," (??? Next is something about the commander of USFK must apologize directly to the Korean people ??? )

Adviser Seo said, " How much the violent US military despises Koreans can I know.." and...

A little later, the Stars and Stripes will give a better translation of this part of Suh's statement on the video.

Adviser Seo also added, "This event is different from the armored vehicle incident which didn't occur in public, so they must stand in Korean court and thoroughly investigate."

In addition, a representative of the Chongrangri police station who came to see Adviser Seo in the hospital emergency room made clear, "I will investigate the details of this event and punish rigorously." John Murphy clarified his opinion by saying, "Because I broke the law, I think I should stand trial in Korean court."

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The last statement was part of the "confession" Murphy was forced to write as part of the anti-US rally.

In the video, Suh recalls that he asked Murphy, “'Why do you curse at me? What did I do wrong?’ I pushed his face and told him to stop cursing more than five times. Then, he stood up and started beating me.”

If you have lived in Korea, you will understand the "pushing his face" reference. On TV dramas and sit coms, you'll see especially older Koreans place their fist, palm up, on the side of another person's forehead, and then push them with a quick jerk - as opposed to a full slap or punch in the face. Koreans are masters of semi-violence. I rarely saw punches thrown in angry drunken disputes between men.

In the above case, besides being confronted by Suh, keep in mind Murphy also claimed the university students were pushing, kicking, and harassing him at the same time.

(The man in the left corner of this image is a grad of "Korea's Harvard" who wrote a VERY popular folk song "Fucking USA" - before the tank accident - Koreans love to sing, and the hate groups were good at using songs - including kids tunes )

In the Joongang Ilbo, Suh gave us more insight --

Mr. Suh remains scornful. "Somebody said it is an American custom to become sensitive when you come into physical contact with another person," he said. "Sure, but is it also an American custom to punch and beat an old man in the face when he is wearing eyeglasses?" Perhaps some Americans in Korea think that Koreans as a people are less worthy than others," Mr. Suh said. "To them, Koreans may be just a plaything."

Mr. Suh's wife said the USFK Deputy Provost Marshal, Lieutenant Colonel Gerald Curry, had apologized to her and other family members at the Cheongnyangni police station for the incident, which, she said, is in effect admission of the assault on her husband.

Page 13

“I don’t need an apology from him but from the U.S. military commander,” Suh says in Korean. “I am very upset at U.S. military treating Korea worse than a beast. They are supposed to be here for the peace but have caused violence and many other problems.”

Suh in Korean insists to the police that Murphy should stand trial in South Korean court. The police assure Suh that Murphy will. “We will definitely handle it by Korean law,” the policeman tells the prone Suh in Korean before turning to Murphy. “Did you really hit him?” asks the officer in English, acting as a translator for Murphy. "Did I really?” Murphy asks back. “I don’t know. I wasn’t looking. I was just swinging. I was scared. I had a lot of people hitting me.”

(The image above is supposedly an American US Embassy staffer on his way to work - some short time before he was slated to leave Korea. 

After 2002, people only remember the orgy of hate the July tank accident unleashed in two different waves.  In reality, large protests were being staged month after month going back to the Fall of 2001 to protest a variety of things - including Pres. Bush labeling Korea (the Northern, despotic part) a member of the Axis of Evil.

The above embassy staffer apparently want to let the protesters who stood out front

Page 14

Below are quotes from a 2nd article from the Stars and Stripes on the 18th with Murphy's version of the story --

“Things happened very fast,” said Lt. Col Steve Boylan, 8th Army spokesman. “There may have been words exchanged in Korean which he did not understand. Next thing he knew he was getting hit in the face and then he got jumped.”

“According to our information, no vulgar words were said — nothing derogatory,” Boylan said.

(A couple of months after this, when Korean society had whipped itself into the 2nd and much larger frenzy of hate, Boylan, the USFK media spokesman, was cut in an attempted stabbing by 3 Korean males as he walked passed them in a pedestrian tunnel leading to USFK's HQ (Yongsan) in Seoul.)

Murphy, who cannot read Korean, reportedly refused to take the flier. Suh, according to USFK’s investigation, punched Murphy in the face and with four other protesters attacked the service member. Owens and Tucker pulled Murphy into another car with the demonstrators in pursuit, the command said. When the train stopped at Hoeki Station in northern Seoul, the trio escaped to the platform and tried to leave the station, but were blocked by as many as 200 protesters, the command said.

(Image - Korea's "righteous rage" can justify even the most vile displays -- in this case the use of 9-11-- to "strike" at "American pride." See this link for other

Page 15

ways some Koreans used 9-11 to promote anti-US sentiment in Korea's youth.) 

Police took custody of Owens and Tucker, USFK said, but the protesters dragged Murphy into a campus stadium, about a block from the hospital, where 6,000 people protested the Korean girls’ deaths, according to Yonhap.

“The captors allegedly forced Murphy to watch the demonstration. … He was photographed and videotaped and … forced to make a public statement about the incident on the train and in support of the demonstrators’ demand for a waiver of jurisdiction in the case of the teens’ deaths,” USFK’s statement said. South Korean police in the area reportedly stood by and watched as Murphy was assaulted.

Murphy suffered a bloody nose, Boylan said. But police spokesman Cho said Murphy suffered no injuries. USFK said all three soldiers were kicked, punched and spat upon. Murphy has been charged with assault, the only charge filed in connection with the incident.

After the stadium protest, the command said, Murphy was taken to the university hospital, where he apologized to Suh “under duress.” The soldiers were questioned for seven hours Sunday by South Korean police, said Steve Oertwig, USFK spokesman.

The US authorities in Korea were hopping mad about this event, and USFK members were furious.  After the NY Times ran a single article about the event, the Korean government and press recognized they had a live bomb on their hands, so they moved quickly to shut things down.

The press changed overnight from calling for Murphy's trial and conviction - to telling Korean society to pour cold water on the anti-US rallies and shut up, because they understood much more coverage of the captivity and mob attack and forced confession of an American soldier could spark a fire in the US.

And the Korean people listened.

Eventually, the prosecutor's office in Seoul simply let the deadline for petitioning to gain custody of Murphy and start the motions toward a trial pass quietly.

Page 16

 It was the captivity of the GI, and what they made him do while they held him, and fear of a backlash in the United States, that saved these three American soldiers from being found guilty in a Korean court and possibly doing jail time.

....that was the only reason.

Because, if you examine the 1994-95 Subway Incident, you will see some common elements with the 2002 version - minus the captivity - that did result in a GI conviction.

1994 Subway Case Facts:

A group of about 11 GIs and their wives and girlfriends were on the subway in Seoul. 

A Korean male thought he was "protecting the honor" of one of the Korean females.

A huge brawl broke out in which around 50 Koreans eventually participated until they brought 1 or more of the GIs to a nearby police station.

2 GIs were subsequently convicted of assault - initially sentenced to jail - but later dropped to a fine on appeal.

The Story:

It is difficult to do an adequate review of this event, because the archives of the Korean English-language papers do not go that far back.

I was able to find an AP report --

It all began when an American soldier put his hand on a Korean woman's rump.

Page 17

The version that has captured the local imagination is that a group of drunken US soldiers were rampaging through the subway, molesting Korean women, and that the soldiers then attacked good citizens who dared protest the errant hand.

"We strongly condemn US military personnel who do not repent and who continue to commit outrageous criminal offenses," declared a group that calls itself the "headquarters to bring an end to crimes by US military stationed in Korea."

The American understanding of events starts with a fact the Koreans tend to leave out: The American soldier and the Korean woman whose behind he patted were a married couple.

This story was still buzzing when I arrived in Korea.  All of my adult classes (which is all I was teaching then) wanted to get my opinion on it and explain to me from the start how USFK and the US in Korea does Korean society wrong all the time.

None of them had a clue that the Korean female the Korean male was "protecting" was the wife of the GI.

The Korean press didn't report it. --- This is another part of the anti-US process.

In the 2002 Tank Accident, the press reported it using terminology similar to "murder" - and they never reported that USFK, the SK government, and the families of the two girls had come to a monetary settlement within 30 days of the event. 

The media also failed to report the memorial service held on base one week after the accident in which VIPs from USFK, the US Embassy, and the Korean government attended - with the service mixing Korean and American mourning customs and hold a military helicopter flyover tribute.

In the 1994 Subway Incident, my students also described the GI's actions that offended the male as anything from sexual harassment to attempted rape - using different terminology as if they were interchangeable.

Page 18

The Americans say the problems arose when some angry young Koreans on the subway accused the American of sexually harassing the Korean woman. When the Korean woman explained that she was the American's wife, the Korean men allegedly spat at her and slapped her-leading the woman's husband to punch the man who slapped her

You might be interested to know - eventually - the Korean wife was also found guilty of a crime and fined along with her husband and 1 other GI.

In the 1990s, Korea's attitude toward mix couples was not pretty.  It still isn't too good (2007), but it has gotten much better.

Also, in the mid-1990s, Korean couples avoided holding hands or having arms around each other.  It was one of the fascinating things to me when I first arrived: 

You would see two male buddies or two female friends holding hands walking through the streets, but such things were taboo for couples. 

By 2000, that had changed greatly, but when the subway incident happened, it was still frowned upon for Koreans themselves.

If you saw my Korean wife and I walking in public, you would not guess we were married.  We have tried to avoid the kinds of confrontations some mixed couples face.  I have faced such confrontations when walking with other Korean females over the years.  It didn't happen frequently.  Overall, I had about 1 to 2 close calls with a Korean with a chip on his shoulder each year - whether I was with a Korean female or not.

Mr. Laney (the US Ambassador to Korea) says the problem is not that US soldiers are committing more crimes, but an irresponsible Korean press is portraying them in a lurid way to an inflamed public.

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Many Koreans say the problem is that American soldiers get special treatment. "The problem is not in the crime itself, but in the criminal process," said Kwon Suk Hun, a 23 year old student council officer at Yonsei University, traditionally a hotbed of social protest. "This process reflects imperialist characteristics of the US government."

"The Korean public's perception is that the SOFA is not meeting with a sense of justice," said Yim Sung Joon, director general of the American affairs bureau in the Foreign Ministry. The most important issue, he said, is to revise the agreement so that arrested American soldiers may be held in Korean custody while awaiting trial.

The US Ambassador speaking against the anti-US culture fostered by institutions like the press only pissed the press and Korean public off more.  You know - just another example of the powerful US trying to "push Korea around" like a "bully."

Next, notice how the thoughts of Korean government people are basically the same as the radical university groups. 

This was true even before the "progressives" witnessed their strength grow with the election of Kim Dae Jung to the presidency in 1998 followed by the very left-leaning Roh Mun-Hyun in 2002.

And I say again --- if you don't know any better to call them to question the GI Crimes Myth - if you left the typical Korean stop at the initial statement of "fact" on this issue, they will usually say GIs are "never" brought to justice in Korea - no matter how many times they see GIs going to jail.  It is baffling.

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You will read one or two stories a year about a fight in the street involving group of "good citizen" Koreans and the bastard GIs. It is usually a carbon copy of these stories we have been going over --

One or more Koreans will say the US soldier started it, and the soldiers will say a Korean did.

Then a mob will have formed, upon seeing the white devil fighting with a Korean, to "hold" the US soldier until the police come.

Then the he said / he said will lead to...the GI alone being taken into custody and criminal charges being filed against him -- but not any of the Koreans.

Look at the review of The Irish Incident to see how other foreigners are treated by the Korean judicial system when such a brawl takes place with claim and counter claim. It isn't just a GI thing, but you will often find that a GI will get charged while the bleeding, gas gun shot Irish were simply ignored.

(I am not sure - if the brawl is just Korean-on-Korean whether the Korean police would ignore it or not.  They might.  Korean policing is much less active than it is in the US where you could be sure in a big fight, some people are going to jail).

What we had in the 1994-95 subway case was:

A Korean man saying he saw a GI or GIs "sexually" bothering a Korean female.

He went to "protect her honor" (which was how my students described it often straight from the press).

The soldier and his wife say the man got angry when she explained she was his wife, and the guy assaulted her - and her husband defended her - and then all hell broke loose as both Koreans and other GIs got into the action.

The Korean man claimed in court that he was protecting the honor of a different woman, but the did not bring any other woman into the court to state she was the real victim.                           Page 21

As noted, the Korean court found 2 GIs guilty and the wife and in the end, all paid a fine - though the husband GI was originally sentenced to some time in jail.

And the case remained one of the big events in the Korean mind that proved just how bad USFK is for Korean society.  Today (2007) I do not know how much it is remembered, but it was well remembered in the late 1990s.

Now, Back to the 2002 subway incident.

We will go over a few of the later takes on the case by the Korean press -- just after they found about the NY Times report on it and they decided it was in Korea's best international image interest to shut things down -- including the massive anti-US demonstrations that had been going on for a couple of months.

This from the Korea Times is a classic of Korean justice when it comes to USFK --

"We are sorting out details and collecting evidence to discover the truth. We plan to summon the soldiers again in the coming days, " Paek Doo-hyun, a police inspector in charge of the case, told The Korea Times. "But we are having difficulties, as the soldiers reject making any statements unfavorable to themselves."

Here is an article from the Chosun Ilbo on 11.03.02 about how the Korean prosecution decided not to try Murphy - notice how there is no mention of Koreans potentially facing a court of law --

Seoul District Prosecutor's office announced Sunday it would not seek jurisdiction, nor prosecute a US serviceman, Private Murphy, who hit former assemblyman Seo Kyeing-won during a scuffle initiated by the latter and involving 20 university students and two other servicemen.

A prosecution official said it had been proven that Seo repeatedly punched Murphy in the face first, and that the private was kidnapped and forcibly detained by the students, therefore invalidating any claims made by the South Koreans.

I really am thankful the Korean police told the press this conclusion and the media printed it ---- but if we are going to rise up in arms if justice isn't served, shouldn't we

Page 22

see Mr. Suh (Seo) charged with something? How about the people who held the soldier for hours and forced him to do humiliating things???

Odd, no?

Here is the Joongang Ilbo covering the same story on 11.04.02 and it sounds a good bit different in what the police said--

The Ministry of Justice has decided not to prosecute a U.S. soldier for a scuffle in September. U.S. Army Private John Murphy had been charged with beating former lawmaker Suh Kyung-won. The ministry said, "Considering the fact that Mr. Suh's wounds were not serious, that he hit Murphy on the head first and that Murphy was detained forcibly by students, we decided not to press our rights to jurisdiction in the case."

That is more like it.

Not "The US soldier was not guilty of a crime.  He was clearly defending himself."

Oh no.. They just decided not to take him to court for a crime.

"Though Koreans are much more interested in the U.S. Army's crimes recently, the Justice Ministry gave up jurisdiction over the case. That is a measure against national sentiment, and we will demonstrate on Friday," the group announced.

The judge in the 2000 Water Dumping case throughout the fine offered by the Seoul prosecutor based on "national sentiment." This is Korean style judgment. An in-depth article I read once but can't locate now said that Korean and East Asian law in general is about finding an adequate penalty based on various factors including "sense of justice" rather than following a strict code of law.

In both the 1994-95 and 2002 Subway Incidents - a US soldier was challenged on the subway by a Korean man or two or three.

Both situations led to huge brawls where many other Koreans "came to the aid" of the initial Korean men.

At least in the 1994-95 case, the GI was with a fairly large group of buddies (I think around 10) who jumped in as well - which was perhaps not the best thing to do - or was - I can't say without seeing how much the lone GI was fairing by himself. 

Meaning, if the Korean mob was just going to hold him until a policeman could be found, it would have been better for the GI buddies to stay out of it.  If, ontheotherhand, the mob was beating the crap out of the GI, the buddies should have joined in whether it was sure to lead to an "international incident" or not.

In both Subway Incidents, the Korean police booked the soldiers for assault and interrogated them to collect evidence for a criminal trial.

It is clear to me - if the US Embassy had not gone hopping mad about the abduction of the 1 GI -- and even then - perhaps if the NY Times had not run a single story on the incident -------- Murphy would have been found guilty of a crime - then most likely sentenced to time in jail - which would likely have been dropped to a fine on appeal.

These were the two biggest incidents where GIs were involved in a street altercation I have found.

But, again, a handful of stories like this come out each year.  They are usually the same. 

The GIs are always the guilty party - both in the court system and in the court of public opinion.

And the incident reinforces the negative stereotype of USFK and also America's overall attitude toward Korea.