Twelve fire service officials have received heavy disciplinary penalties — including two removals from office — over the workplace harassment that drove a female firefighter in Gwangju to her death.
The fire headquarters of the South Jeolla-Gwangju integrated special city convened a disciplinary committee for fire service officials on Friday and deliberated on penalties for 15 civil servants found to have violated regulations in a probe by the Office for Government Policy Coordination's joint public service compliance inspection team, the agency announced Monday.
Of the 15 officials reviewed, 12 received heavy disciplinary penalties, including two removals from office — the most severe sanction available — while the remaining three received lighter penalties.
The committee weighed the circumstances and degree of responsibility for misconduct confirmed during the investigation, including coercion to attend drinking gatherings, inappropriate responses to the bereaved family's calls for an investigation, and violations of regulations in the handling of personal information.
The Office for Government Policy Coordination released the results of its probe on June 24. The probe covered the National Fire Agency, the South Jeolla-Gwangju integrated special city fire headquarters and the Gwangsan Fire Station, and the office called for disciplinary action against 17 people involved.
Of those, two officials belonging to the National Fire Agency were reviewed by the agency's own disciplinary body, while the remaining 15 — nine from the South Jeolla-Gwangju fire headquarters and six from the Gwangsan Fire Station — were reviewed by the integrated city fire headquarters' disciplinary committee.
The investigation found that the officials had repeatedly pressured the late firefighter, identified only as A, to drink and attend after-work gatherings, assigned her personal errands, ignored the bereaved family's calls for an investigation, and leaked distorted records of her psychological counseling sessions.
Firefighter A died by suicide last October. The investigation found she had attended 24 work-related drinking gatherings between July 2024 and early October last year. At late-night sessions in nightclubs and noraebang, she was subjected to inappropriate demands — including being told to sit between the station chief and a department head, and to address male superiors informally as "oppa."
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