The Ministry of Justice said on the 29th that it withdrew or waived appeals to higher courts in 863 damages suits filed by victims of Brothers Home, Seongam Orphanage, Samcheong Reeducation Camp, and the Oct. 29 Yeosu-Suncheon incident (Yeosu-Suncheon incident) against the state. A total of 2,202 victims in these cases received about 199.579 billion won in compensation.
For the Brothers Home cases, as of last month the Ministry of Justice withdrew or waived appeals in a total of 116 cases across the first through third instances involving 756 victims. For Seongam Orphanage, 42 cases (357 people); for Samcheong Reeducation Camp, 608 cases (1,070 people); and for the Yeosu-Suncheon incident, 97 cases (904 people) saw appeals withdrawn or waived.
Also, through prosecutors' ex officio petitions for retrial, 2,208 people related to the Jeju April 3 Incident and 107 in the abducted-and-returned fishermen cases were acquitted. The Ministry of Justice said, "In situations where many victims had already died or were elderly and found it difficult to petition for retrial themselves, the state filed ex officio for retrials, resulting in acquittals."
There are also cases where prior suspended indictments were canceled and changed to "no suspicion." The Seoul Southern District Prosecutors' Office, after reopening the case ex officio, issued a no-suspicion disposition for a person surnamed Lee who had received a suspended indictment for violating the National Security Act in 1983 for possessing Karl Marx's "Das Kapital."