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SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A man who stabbed South Korea’s opposition leader in the neck earlier this year was sentenced to 15 years in prison on Friday, court officials said.
The knife-wielding man attacked Lee Jae-myung, head of the liberal Democratic Party, South Korea’s biggest political party, in January after approaching him asking for his autograph at an event in the southeastern city of Busan. After being detained by police, he told investigators that he wanted to kill Lee to prevent him from becoming South Korea’s president.
15 years for stabbing someone in the neck, regardless of their job, seems fair, imo. Let’s compare some other cases:
- USA: Christian Soto faces multiple life sentences for a stabbing spree in Rockford, Illinois, in March 2024 (Northern Public Radio, The Independent).
- UK: Joshua Jacques got a life sentence for killing four people in the 2022 Bermondsey stabbing (Wikipedia).
- Canada: Alek Minassian received life imprisonment for the 2018 Toronto van attack, comparable to severe stabbing cases (BBC).
- Australia: Mert Ney was sentenced to 44 years for his 2019 Sydney stabbing rampage (ABC News).
- Germany: Ali Bashar got a life sentence for murder and assault in Wiesbaden in 2018 (DW).
How are any of these comparable? Multiple people were killed/injured from those attacks, so I’m confused by your comment. What point are you trying to make?
If you see how other similar cases usually go by in South Korea though… This seems to be more than what usually gets sentenced.
South Korean law is a joke. Forced minor into prostitution? Probation. Attempted rape of a minor? Probation or maybe few months.
Thought it wasn’t as bad as their neighbor to be fair.
Any idea of the recidivism rates vs. us here in the United Prison Industrial Complex of America?
Attempted murder, which this was, regularly (as in in almost all cases) means you get a rebate on that life sentence in Germany. Depending on circumstances it’s going to be 3-15 years. In any case also a life-long sentence means parole after minimum 15, median 17, average, 18.9 years, only 13% >25 years.
People dying in prison is quite rare because, overall, unrepentant nasty pieces of work are rare… and Ali Bashar happens to be one of those cases: Murderer-rapist, court declared notable gravity of his guilt, meaning the minimum to parole is 20, also, even if he gets out on parole (most likely not after 20 years) courts reserved the right to put him in preventive detention, meaning he’d be out of the prison regime (bedtime and whatnot) but still in lockup. Essentially an asylum for the not criminally insane.