An image of the related agencies' countermeasure meeting held on the afternoon of the 24th at the Seoul Regional Employment and Labor Office conference room to prepare for major industrial accidents. Photo by Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office
[Asia Economy Choi Seok-jin, Legal Affairs Specialist Reporter] The prosecution and labor authorities responsible for investigating 'serious industrial accidents' under the Serious Accident Punishment Act have selected the 'construction industry' as a key management target and decided to strengthen management and supervision of construction sites.
On the 24th, the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office, Seoul Regional Employment and Labor Office, and Korea Occupational Safety and Health Agency Seoul Regional Headquarters held a joint meeting at the Seoul Regional Employment and Labor Office conference room to prepare for the occurrence of serious industrial accidents and made this decision.
These agencies also agreed to establish a cooperative system among related organizations to share response situations by agency and discuss response measures in the event of serious industrial accidents, including efficient initial investigation methods.
Considering the recent spread of COVID-19, the number of attendees was minimized at the meeting: 4 people from the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office, including 2 prosecutors dedicated to serious industrial accidents; 5 people from the Seoul Regional Employment and Labor Office, including the head of the Metropolitan Serious Accident Management Division; and 2 people from the Korea Occupational Safety and Health Agency Seoul Regional Headquarters, including the head of the Metropolitan Accident Investigation Center, totaling 11 attendees.
The Seoul Regional Employment and Labor Office plans to disseminate the contents discussed at this meeting to its subordinate agencies.
These agencies first agreed on the necessity to select the 'construction industry' as a key management target for focused inspection, considering Seoul's regional characteristics where many large-scale construction projects such as apartments are underway, and decided to strengthen management and supervision of construction sites.
Last year, there were 51 industrial accident-related deaths in the Seoul area, of which 39 (76.5%) were in the construction sector, overwhelmingly outnumbering deaths in manufacturing (2), retail, transportation, service industries, and other sectors (10).
Among industrial accident deaths last year that could be subject to the Serious Accident Punishment Act (workplaces with 50 or more regular employees, construction projects with a contract amount of 5 billion KRW or more), there were 17 deaths in the construction sector, 2 in manufacturing, and 8 in other sectors, totaling 27.
These agencies also agreed on the necessity of an investigative consultative body considering the type of incident and scale of damage for prompt and effective response in the event of serious industrial accident cases.
They further agreed to activate a real-time response system using hotlines and video conferences among related organizations immediately after an incident to share investigation status and materials.
In the event of a serious accident, the prosecution will cooperate with the labor office from the early stages of the investigation regarding investigation starting points, selection of investigation targets, and evidence collection, and will actively support the entire investigation process including forced investigations such as search and seizure, digital evidence analysis, and legal review.
The labor office will also conduct investigations organically by sharing investigation status with the prosecution in real time from the initial stage and will continue cooperation through the referral and prosecution maintenance stages.
Article 2 (Definitions) Clause 1 of the Serious Accident Punishment Act defines serious accidents as including serious industrial accidents and serious citizen accidents. Clause 2 defines serious industrial accidents under the Industrial Safety and Health Act as accidents with ▲ one or more deaths ▲ two or more injuries requiring treatment for six months or longer from the same accident ▲ three or more occupational diseases such as acute poisoning caused by the same harmful factor occurring within one year.
Clause 3 defines serious citizen accidents as accidents caused by defects in the design, manufacture, installation, or management of specific raw materials or manufactured goods, public facilities, or public transportation, resulting in ▲ one or more deaths ▲ ten or more injuries requiring treatment for two months or longer from the same accident ▲ ten or more illnesses requiring treatment for three months or longer from the same cause.
Following the adjustment of investigative authority between prosecution and police, the prosecution's direct investigation of serious accident cases is limited to large-scale disaster crimes related to social disasters. Specifically, these include cases such as fire, collapse, explosion, traffic accidents, chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) accidents, environmental pollution accidents, where human or property damage occurs requiring national or local government-level response and where national core infrastructure is paralyzed.
Therefore, under the current legal system, the primary investigation of most serious accident cases is handled by the police and the Ministry of Employment and Labor.
Specifically, serious industrial accident cases are investigated by nine metropolitan regional labor offices, while serious citizen accident cases are investigated by city/provincial police agencies and then referred to the prosecutors' office with jurisdiction over the accident location. The prosecution is responsible for directing investigations, prosecution, and maintaining prosecution of cases under investigation by labor offices, as well as prosecution and maintenance of cases referred by the police.
Meanwhile, the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office has designated 11 prosecutors to be in charge of investigating serious industrial and citizen accidents. For serious industrial accidents, 2 prosecutors belong to the Criminal Division 10. For serious citizen accidents, 2 prosecutors in the Criminal Division 2 handle raw material/manufactured goods defects, 2 in Criminal Division 3 handle fires, 2 in Criminal Division 5 handle public transportation defects, and 3 in Criminal Division 8 handle public facility defects.
The Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office stated, "Going forward, through organic cooperation with related organizations, we will respond swiftly and strictly to serious industrial accident crimes that threaten the lives and safety of the public, and strive to ensure that business owners and management officials receive punishments commensurate with their responsibilities."
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