Sewol Ferry 1; Captain Lee
The captain of the South Korean ferry that capsized in April has escaped the death penalty and has instead been sentenced to 36 years in jail for his role in the tragedy.
Lee Joon-seok was acquitted of murder but found guilty of gross negligence for abandoning passengers onboard the overloaded Sewol ferry. More than 300 people died in what was one of South Korea’s worst maritime disasters. The vast majority of the victims were school children.
Captain Lee and several of his crew members fled the ship after it capsized and were among the first to be rescued by the coast guard. They were accused of causing hundreds of unnecessary deaths by failing to issue evacuation orders and telling the children to stay in their cabins.
The court said it could not conclude that the defendants "were aware that all of the victims would die because of their actions and they had an intention to kill them," therefore, "the murder charges are not accepted," The Times reports.
Prosecutors had demanded the death penalty and before the trial even started, President Park Geun-hye made a public statement condemning the crew's action, saying that their decision to abandon ship had been "tantamount to murder".
The sentence means that Lee, aged 69, is likely to spend the rest of life in jail for his role in the tragedy, the BBC's Steve Evans reports. The 14 crew members were found guilty of various charges, including negligence and were sentenced to between five and 20 years in prison.
The victims’ families issued a statement saying that they were "devastated" by the verdict and that justice had failed, The Guardian reports. One mother shouted: "It's not fair. What about the lives of our children? They (the defendants) deserve worse than death."
Coinciding with the verdicts, authorities have officially called off the seven-month search for the missing bodies. Divers have retrieved 295 bodies from the ocean, but nine still remain unaccounted for.
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