Assault on 60s Taxi Driver, Employee Beating... 4 Months Imprisonment
A comedian in his 40s who was charged with verbally abusing a taxi driver and causing a disturbance inside the taxi after believing he was refused a ride was sentenced to prison and taken into custody in court.
According to a Yonhap News report on the 28th, Choi Hae-il, a judge of the Criminal Division 4 at Suwon District Court, sentenced A (43), who was indicted without detention on charges including violation of the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes (assault on a driver), assault, and insult, to four months in prison.
A was charged with threatening and intimidating B, a taxi driver in his 60s, by repeatedly kicking the front passenger seat and verbally abusing him after boarding the back seat of the taxi driven by B on a road in Yongin-si, Gyeonggi Province, in the early morning of March 29 last year. At the time, A thought he was refused a ride because B did not stop the taxi in front of him but passed by and stopped at a somewhat distant location while A was trying to get in the taxi. He then walked to where the taxi had stopped, boarded the taxi, and caused the disturbance.
In addition, A is also accused of assaulting and insulting a staff member in his 50s who works at the entertainment office he runs. On March 18 of the same year, near his office located in Cheoin-gu, Yongin-si, Gyeonggi Province, he hit the right arm of staff member C in his 50s with a camera mount and even threw a no-parking rubber cone and stones. On the same day, in front of several people, A insulted C by saying, "If you want to report me, go ahead, XX."
Judge Choi stated, "The defendant has a history of being punished multiple times for similar crimes," and added, "He also voluntarily failed to appear during this trial and did not show remorse during the recidivism period, which makes the guilt serious." However, he considered that "the defendant acknowledged the main facts of the crime and showed some remorse, and the degree and method of physical violence against the victims do not appear to be very severe."
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