An illustration image for reference [123RF]
An illustration image for reference [123RF]

With executions suspended for nearly three decades, South Korea currently holds 52 inmates on death row in its correctional facilities, with an average age of 58.7, according to official figures.

The Ministry of Justice released the data Tuesday, four days before World Day Against the Death Penalty on Oct. 10.

Among those awaiting execution are serial killers Yoo Young-chul and Kang Ho-soon, who killed 20 and 10 people respectively. Both remain at Seoul Detention Center in Uiwang, Gyeonggi Province, with their sentences unexecuted.

Inmates in their 50s make up the largest group at 29, followed by five in their 40s and one in their 30s. No one in their 20s is on death row. Those aged 60 and older — 10 in their 60s and seven in their 70s — account for 32.7 percent of the total.

The death row population is aging as the debate over abolishing capital punishment remains unresolved.

In 2024, Oh Jong-geun, convicted in the "Boseong fisherman serial murder case," died at 87 after suffering from a chronic illness.

In March this year, Lee Woo-cheol, a member of the "Anyang AP gang" convicted of killing a fellow gang member and his girlfriend, died of cancer while incarcerated at Gwangju Prison.

South Korea has not carried out an execution in nearly 30 years, since Dec. 30, 1997, when 23 people — including members of the Jijonpa criminal organization — were put to death in the final year of President Kim Young-sam's administration.

Amnesty International has classified South Korea as an "abolitionist in practice" country since 2007.

Won Eon-sik, 69, who set fire to a religious facility in Wonju, Gangwon Province, in 1992, killing 15 people, has now spent 35 years in detention — making him the longest-serving death row inmate in the country.

The most recently confirmed death sentence was handed to Lim Do-bin, then a sergeant, who opened fire at a General Outpost of the Army's 22nd Division in Goseong-gun, Gangwon Province, in 2014, killing five fellow soldiers.

Unlike civilians, who face death by hanging, military personnel are subject to execution by firing squad under the Military Criminal Act.

On Wednesday, a court of first instance sentenced Jang Yun-gi to life in prison for kidnapping and killing a high school student, Lee Chae-won, with the intent to commit a sex crime — a ruling that drew sharp criticism from the victim's family.

Prosecutors had sought the death penalty for Jang, but the court ruled that a life sentence was "consistent with the proportional balance established by numerous similar precedents in which courts have long refrained from imposing the death penalty."

The Constitutional Court received a third constitutional petition challenging the legality of capital punishment in 2019 but has yet to issue a ruling eight years on.

The Catholic Bishops' Conference of Korea, which filed the petition, argues that "even when carried out in the name of the law, human life must not be treated carelessly," adding that "academia has repeatedly published findings through years of research showing that capital punishment does not have a decisive deterrent effect on crime."

The Constitutional Court previously upheld the constitutionality of the death penalty in 1996 and 2010.

The justices who voted to uphold it in 2010 ruled that "the public interest achieved through capital punishment — crime prevention, protection of the lives of innocent citizens, the realization of justice, and social defense — cannot be considered lesser than the private interest of the right to life of those who have committed heinous crimes."

Legal circles generally hold that overturning those precedents would be difficult, but observers note the outcome cannot be predicted, given that the margin has steadily narrowed — from 7-2 in 1996 to 5-4 in 2010.

A ruling of unconstitutionality requires the agreement of at least six of the nine justices.

Some in the legal community have called for introducing a sentence of absolute life imprisonment without the possibility of parole as an alternative to the death penalty.

The court that sentenced Jang in the first instance also stated that "the only way to offer even a measure of comfort to the victim and her family, and to prevent the recurrence of similar crimes, is to strictly enforce a life sentence that never permits parole for as long as the defendant lives."

The argument is that those convicted of violent crimes and sentenced to life should be permanently separated from society until their final moment. Under Article 72 of the Criminal Act, even inmates serving life sentences become eligible for parole review by the Ministry of Justice after serving 20 or more years.

However, there is considerable pushback, with critics arguing that such a sentence eliminates any possibility of rehabilitation and risks infringing on fundamental rights.

Some also point to the global trend toward abolishing life without parole, including in Germany and across the EU.

The Ministry of Justice introduced a bill in 2023 to amend the Criminal Act to establish an absolute life sentence, but it failed to pass the National Assembly after facing opposition from the Supreme Court and others, and was ultimately scrapped.


husn7@heraldcorp.com