Acting Commissioner Kim Jong-cheol will visit Jeju for his first on-site move after taking office. He will directly inspect the case of a police officer who handled a case poorly after a missing-person report and falsely closed it, and review Jeju police's response system for missing-person cases.
According to the Korean National Police Agency on the 2nd, Kim will begin his official duties by presiding over a leadership meeting attended by commissioners of the 18 metropolitan and provincial police agencies nationwide at the Korean National Police Agency Eoullim Madang in Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, at 9 a.m. on the 3rd. Fourteen newly appointed metropolitan and provincial police commissioners will also attend the meeting.
After the meeting, he will travel to Jeju. He will pay his respects at the mourning altar of the deceased missing person and visit a palm farm in Hallim-eup, Jeju City, where the person was found, to directly review the initial response and search process after the report was filed. He will then receive a briefing at the Jeju Provincial Police Agency on the current state of responses to missing-person cases and measures to prevent a recurrence.
On the day, at the Gyeongnam Provincial Police Agency, Kim referred to the Jeju missing-person case and said, "I am worried that public distrust in police investigations and administration may have passed the breaking point," and added, "There is a need to go over each matter to the extent that it could be described as a 'redesign' across all police duties."
In Jeju, a woman in her 30s who went missing in May was found dead 104 days after the report. Sergeant A, who handled the case, closed it without confirming the woman's safety and was sent to detention on charges including falsely entering in the system that she had died.
In another missing-person case that Sergeant A closed in a similar manner, a man in his 60s was found dead 51 days after the report.
The Korean National Police Agency is conducting a full review of about 310,000 missing-person cases that occurred over the past three years, prompted by the Jeju case. It also established a procedure requiring approval by a Director when a person in charge requests the closure of a missing-person case.