Police Officer Father Who Broke Son's Phone After Hidden Camera Attempt on Female Teacher Cleared Under Family Exception

[Financial News] A serving police officer who was under investigation for destroying his teenage son's phone, which was used as evidence in an attempted illegal filming case involving a teacher, has been cleared without referral to prosecutors.
According to Yonhap News Agency and others on the 13th, the Jeonbuk Police Agency said it had decided not to refer Senior Inspector A, who had been investigated on suspicion of destroying evidence, to prosecutors.
In May, A was accused of hiding evidence by damaging and discarding his son's phone after the high school student, B, was caught trying to secretly film part of his homeroom teacher's body with a mobile phone.
The victim filed a complaint against B. Police investigated him on charges of violating the Act on Special Cases Concerning the Punishment of Sexual Crimes, including camera-based filming, and sent the case to prosecutors in June.
During questioning, B was reported to have said that his father threw the phone and broke it. Police later launched compulsory measures, including a search of A's home, after detecting signs that A and his wife had destroyed evidence.
The case was uncovered while the National Police Agency was conducting a nationwide review of cases involving police families, following allegations of a poor investigation and a cover-up in the case of Jang Yoon-gi, the murderer of a high school girl in Gwangju, whose father was a senior police officer.
When suspicions of evidence destruction by A emerged, the Women and Juvenile Crime Investigation Unit of the Jeonbuk Police Agency launched an investigation. Under the family exception, simple evidence destruction itself is not punishable, but aiding and abetting evidence destruction can be punished depending on the circumstances.
Police reviewed A's phone, internal messenger records, and call logs from the investigation team, but said they found no signs that fellow officers helped destroy evidence or that A advised family members or others to do so.
The Jeonbuk Police Agency said, "We decided not to refer A because his evidence destruction charge cannot be punished under the family exception," adding, "We conducted a broad investigation into whether there had been any attempt to induce evidence destruction, but found no relevant signs."
However, police said they plan to discipline A, citing that his conduct was inappropriate for a police officer and highly blameworthy.
[email protected] Kim Soo-yeon Reporter