Photo is unrelated to the article. [Getty Images Bank]
Photo is unrelated to the article. [Getty Images Bank]

A woman in her 80s with severe dementia was sexually assaulted multiple times by a male caregiver in his 70s, a case that has drawn widespread shock after it came to light.

According to JTBC's "Sageon Banjang," a crime news program, the woman had been attending a senior day care center in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, where the assaults took place.

According to a tipster identified only as A, the elderly woman had been living with her children for six years, and the family had been sending her to the center for about two years.

In January last year, the woman returned home about an hour earlier than usual. A reviewed home security camera footage to check whether the mother had arrived safely and witnessed a disturbing scene.

The footage showed the male caregiver entering the home, cupping the woman's cheeks in his hands and pulling her into a tight embrace.

Female caregivers had typically called for the woman from the front door, but the male caregiver entered the home and continued making physical contact with her.

Alarmed, A reviewed earlier footage and found additional incidents in which the caregiver had hugged the woman from behind, sat her on the floor and pressed his cheek against hers.

In one instance, the caregiver grabbed the woman's chest with both hands from behind as she emerged from her room.

The woman tried to push him away and said "I have to go," attempting to leave, but the caregiver continued the physical contact, according to the report.

The family immediately complained to the center, but staff defended the caregiver, saying he was "a person full of warmth and love" who had only been "trying to treat her affectionately."

The center also told the family it had "repeatedly cautioned him not to act too freely or follow his feelings around the elderly."

Despite the family's complaint, the caregiver was not removed from duty immediately.

The center told the family it had received a written apology from him but said labor law made it difficult to dismiss someone outright, adding that it would "do its best to keep them apart" and that he was "not the type to cause harm."

The caregiver did not resign until February last year, about a month after the incident came to the family's attention.

Facing trial after the family filed a criminal complaint, the caregiver claimed innocence, telling the court that "warmth and kindness seem to have caused a misunderstanding" and that "some physical contact is unavoidable when empathizing with elderly patients."

The caregiver also argued that the behavior "may have been a bit excessive, but was not done with impure intent," and appealed to the court to view the actions "not as those of a man, but of a caregiver."

The court was not persuaded. In April, a first-instance court sentenced the caregiver to one year and six months in prison, suspended for two years, finding that the repeated assaults over multiple days reflected poor moral character.

The victim's family refused the 30 million won ($22,500) the caregiver had deposited with the court as a gesture of remorse, and prosecutors appealed the ruling.


choigo@heraldcorp.com