Police officer indicted for falsifying arrest records after hit-and-run suspect turned himself in

A senior police officer has been indicted for falsifying arrest documents to make it appear he had chased down and apprehended a hit-and-run suspect who had in fact walked into a police substation and confessed to the fatal crash.

The Uiseong Branch of the Daegu District Prosecutors Office announced Thursday that it had indicted Inspector A, attached to a police station in North Gyeongsang Province, without detention on Wednesday on charges of unlawful arrest through abuse of authority, forgery and use of electronic public records, and violation of the Act on Promotion of Digitalization of Criminal Justice Procedures.

Inspector A is accused of voluntarily escorting hit-and-run suspect B to a police station for questioning after B appeared at a substation on his own on May 22, then filing emergency arrest documents falsely stating that B had been apprehended after a chase outside the substation.

B was suspected of causing a traffic accident while drunk around midnight that same day and fleeing the scene. The victim later died.

After learning that police had identified him through his vehicle's license plate and gone to his home, B voluntarily appeared at the substation around 6 p.m. that day. He was then escorted to the police station, where he confessed to drunk driving and hit-and-run during questioning.

About four and a half hours later, however, Inspector A placed B under emergency arrest at around 10:30 p.m. The emergency arrest form listed B as having been apprehended after a chase outside the substation at around 6:16 p.m. — recording that time, location and circumstances as the basis for the arrest, investigators found.

Prosecutors, while reviewing the emergency arrest request submitted by police, found the circumstances of the arrest unclear and called for further explanation. When police resubmitted the request without meaningful clarification, prosecutors declined to approve the emergency arrest in the early hours of the following morning and ordered B's immediate release.

After taking over the case, prosecutors determined that the conditions required for an emergency arrest — such as a risk of flight or destruction of evidence — had not been met, given that B had appeared voluntarily and confessed. They also confirmed that Inspector A had recorded details inconsistent with what had actually occurred.

Prosecutors referred the question of how to handle Inspector A to a citizens' review committee, which voted unanimously in favor of indictment.

B was also indicted without detention on Wednesday on charges related to the fatal hit-and-run.

Shin Eun-sik, chief of the Uiseong Branch, said the conduct warranted strict punishment. "In a system where decisions must be made primarily on the basis of the record, an officer entering false information into that record is something we determined must be punished severely," he said.