The Book Given by the Judge to the Homeless Person in Court... Yi Hwa's 'Life'

Busan District Court Chief Judge Park Ju-young Shows Compassion After Verdict
"Be Sure to Visit Your Mother's Grave"... Defendant Also Moved to Tears

There is a saying, "Hate the sin, but not the sinner." Sin is negative, but since the sin is not committed by the person themselves, one should not make a negative judgment. Recently, a judge who sentenced a homeless man to prison and then comforted him by giving him a book and 100,000 won has brought this phrase back into the spotlight.

Chief Judge Park Ju-young.
Photo by Yonhap News

According to the legal community on the 26th, Judge Park Ju-young, head of the Criminal Division 1 at the Eastern Branch of Busan District Court, sentenced a man in his 50s, Mr. A, who was tried on charges of special intimidation, to six months in prison with a two-year probation on the 20th. He also ordered two years of probation supervision.

Mr. A is accused of threatening another homeless man, Mr. B, with a weapon after an argument while drinking in front of a convenience store in Busan around 1 a.m. on September 28. It is known that after drawing the weapon, he broke the knife by stepping on it himself. He was arrested following a citizen’s report and was detained due to his unstable residence.

Judge Park spared Mr. A from imprisonment, citing reasons such as ▲Mr. A breaking the weapon himself by stepping on it at the scene ▲the victim Mr. B not wanting punishment ▲it being his first offense ▲and the possibility of reform.

Judge Park then expressed concern by asking, "How are you maintaining your livelihood?" and advised, "Find a stable residence, live within the social security system, and take care of your health." Upon learning that Mr. A liked books, he also gave him a book titled Life by Chinese author Yu Hua along with 100,000 won in cash.

Life is a representative work by Yu Hua, a Chinese author famous for Chronicle of a Blood Merchant. It tells the story of Fugui, a man who fell from being a reckless rich young master to a poor farmer, losing his family and property amid the turbulent history marked by the Chinese Civil War, the Great Leap Forward, and the Cultural Revolution, and who reflects on his life alone. The publisher introduced the book as "a work that willingly acknowledges the lives of ordinary Chinese people who endured about 40 years of harsh history from before and after liberation without even a sense of hardship, from the fundamental perspective of 'life and death,' and played a decisive role in elevating Yu Hua to the ranks of world-class authors."

Mr. A has been homeless since his early 30s after his parents passed away and has lived in isolation by collecting scrap paper and metal. Judge Park also urged Mr. A to "make sure to visit your mother’s grave." Upon hearing this, Mr. A reportedly felt grateful to Judge Park and was moved to tears.

Judge Park said, "This was a case that would not have led to detention if it were an ordinary person, but it was unfortunate that prejudice against the homeless led to detention," and added, "I hope this will serve as a small opportunity to look after socially vulnerable people together, rather than ending as a personal anecdote."

Meanwhile, in 2019, Judge Park also demonstrated that the purpose of the law is improvement rather than punishment by sentencing a person who was charged with attempted assisted suicide after surviving a joint suicide attempt alone to probation, giving him a letter saying "I am confident that better days will come" along with 200,000 won for transportation expenses.

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