By Via a reader tip comes the lamest excuse ever for getting out of community service:
The Seoul High Court revoked a lower court’s community service order for a convicted U.S. soldier stationed in South Korea on Wednesday.
It overturned a lower court’s ruling that sentenced the unidentified soldier, 22, to a 20-month jail term suspended for three years and 120 hours of community service.
The high court upheld the suspension but ruled the community service order was not appropriate, arguing that the applicable law does not apply to those subject to military law.
He was charged and convicted for robbing a supermarket in the city of Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province, in August 2008. He had appealed the lower court ruling, citing practical difficulties such as the language barrier in executing his community service.
Some 28,500 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea, a legacy of the 1950-1953 Korean War. [Korea Times]
This soldier likely paid compensation money to the victim of the crime, but basically the soldier received no punishment for the crime since everything was suspended for three years.
4:13 pm on May 7th, 2009 1
I wonder if maybe Korea shouldn't fix it so GIs like this are tried in a Korean military court like Korean soldiers are — they might get a tougher deal. Or just let the US military handle them – where they'll also likely get a tougher sentence.
On the community service — GIs regularly go to old folks homes and orphanages. And they go to local schools to tutor in English. They could be used in tourist info centers or other gov. offices where foreigners are dealt with and the Korean staff has people fairly fluent to fluent in English…
Lame excuse….
11:29 pm on May 8th, 2009 2
Whoa, translation alert!!!
What does "robbing" mean here? Did he, as the term suggests to me, go in with his weapon, order the employees to the floor, and clean out the registers… and get such a sentence??? Or did he, perhaps, "shoplift" some stuff?
It might, um, show some journalistic skill to present such relevant details (if word count is an issue) instead of having to remind readers that the US was once involved in a war over here…
9:48 am on May 9th, 2009 3
Excellent point…