'Unlicensed Driving' Bold Teenagers... "Stealing Rental Cars, Identity Theft"

[Asia Economy Reporter Song Seung-yoon] Cases of teenagers without driver's licenses driving cars and causing accidents or committing crimes are increasing.

According to the police on the 8th, the Gangdong Police Station in Seoul is investigating four teenage youths on suspicion of special robbery after assaulting two peers in Suyu-dong, Gangbuk-gu, the previous night, then forcing them into a rental car and extorting money by visiting ATMs.

They committed the crime using a rental car registered under someone else's name and were caught around 1 a.m. in Gangdong-gu while fleeing. They also crashed into a guardrail while driving.

On the previous morning, a 112 report was received from a rental car company in Mapo-gu, Seoul, reporting a vehicle theft. This was also a crime committed by teenagers.

The teenagers who stole the vehicle drove about 30 km and abandoned the car on a street in Yadong-dong, Paju, Gyeonggi Province, then fled. They were caught by the police around 10:30 a.m. the same day. While fleeing, they ignored police orders to stop and damaged two parking lot barriers at an apartment complex.

Investigations revealed that they secretly took the car keys from the rental car company's office and took the wheel. The Paju Police Station in Gyeonggi Province booked driver A (16) and passenger B (15) without detention on charges including special theft, and are tracking the other two teenage youths who fled from the back seat.

In October last year, C (18), who was driving a car rented under a stolen identity on a four-lane road in Hwasun-gun, Jeollanam-do, hit and killed a woman in her 20s crossing a crosswalk. Four teenagers, including him, were in the car at the time.

According to data submitted by the Road Traffic Authority to Park Jae-ho, a member of the National Assembly's Public Administration and Security Committee from the Democratic Party of Korea, there were a total of 3,301 traffic accidents involving unlicensed teenage drivers from 2015 to 2019. These accidents resulted in 91 deaths and 4,849 injuries. During the same period, there were 405 traffic accidents involving unlicensed teenage drivers in rental cars, resulting in 8 deaths and 722 injuries.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.