Former Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency Commissioner Kim Kwang-ho is innocent of the first trial.

Former Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency Commissioner Kim Kwang-ho, who is suspected of responding to the Itaewon disaster, was acquitted in the first trial.

The Seoul Western District Court acquitted former Commissioner Kim yesterday (17th) of charges of professional negligence and other injuries.

The court judged that the head of the Seoul Metropolitan Government had no choice but to rely on the information report of the Yongsan Police Station, which is a front-line document, but he would not have been able to grasp the concerns of large-scale crowd accidents in detail.

He also explained that it seems difficult to say that the incident has been expanded because of former Commissioner Kim, considering that he ordered the police task force to be dispatched immediately after recognizing the accident.

At the same time, he expressed disappointment and deep regret over the lack of a proper national response to social disasters.Ryu Mi-jin, former head of personnel education division at the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, and Jeong Dae-kyung, former head of the 112 situation team, who were handed over to trial on the same charges as former Commissioner

Kim were also acquitted.

Earlier, Kim Kwang-ho, former head of the Seoul Metropolitan Government, was put on trial on charges of raising the disaster with inappropriate responses, such as not deploying appropriate police forces even though he predicted a situation of 100,000 people in Itaewon during Halloween Day 2022.

The prosecution asked former Commissioner Kim for five years in prison at the final trial.