Police, judging that public anxiety has grown after an incident in which a high school girl with no prior connection was killed on a downtown street in Gwangju, decided to strengthen patrols and stop-and-search operations.
The Korean National Police Agency said on the 8th that it will suppress the crime atmosphere through visible police activity to prevent similar crimes from recurring.
On the day, Acting Commissioner Yoo Jae-sung held a video conference with police leadership nationwide and decided to strengthen patrols, focusing on sparsely populated places, by using local police, metropolitan preventive patrol units, and mobile units dedicated to public safety.
They also plan to increase patrols in areas of crime concern in cooperation with voluntary crime-prevention groups and private security firms. They will conduct stop-and-searches of people suspected of carrying weapons or acting suspiciously.
In addition, they announced measures including: ▲ if a 112 call reports public threats or possession of a weapon in a public place, issuing emergency code 0 or code 1 with the goal of "dispatch in the shortest time"; ▲ for major cases, the police station chief will go to the scene and take command; ▲ strengthening security facilities such as intelligent closed-circuit (CC) TV on student routes to and from school, day and night, together with local governments; ▲ and strengthening measures for high-risk people with mental illness.