“Broken Arrow,” a court drama film depicting a laid-off professor’s unsuccessful challenge to what he believed were unjust legal proceedings, was a box office leader during the lunar New Year holiday. It can be taken as yet another testimonial to the dwindling public trust in the nation’s justice system, although some attribute its success to the popularity of the two top actors Ahn Sung-ki and Moon Sung-keun.
It was only last autumn that another court film, “Dogani (Melting Pot),” stirred controversy over the court’s nearly condoning of staff and teachers at a school for the disabled who were accused of sexually abusing their young students. If “Dogani” touched off public anger in the court’s inability to establish justice, “Broken Arrow” exposed attempts by the court to conceal its fallacy at the expense of the right of the accused. Both films were based on true stories.
In an unusual move, the Supreme Court prepared a two-page press release before the nationwide opening of “Broken Arrow” to explain how some details in the film were different from the facts the court recognized in the criminal trial of Prof. Kim Myeong-ho. Kim was imprisoned for four years convicted of assault resulting in injury. The victim in the “armed attack” was the presiding judge in a civil suit who dismissed Kim’s appeal for his reinstatement.
Kim had been denied reappointment after he claimed a mistake in his university’s entrance examination. He filed a suit for a return to his position in 2005 but he lost both in the district and appellate courts. On the evening of Jan. 15, 2007, he visited the apartment of Judge Park Hong-u in Seoul and shot at him with a crossbow. The prosecution at first charged him with attempted murder and then indicted him for assault leading to injury while the defendant claimed he had only shot a broken arrow in an attempt to scare the judge.
What is particularly disturbing about the public reactions to these films is not that the dramatization of alleged impropriety of the court system could damage people’s trust in the legal institution. The popularity of “Dogani” and “Broken Arrow” may rather prove the depleted credibility of the court and respect for judges in today’s Korean society. The frequently reported indiscreet behaviors of some judges these days are helping blemish the court’s dignity.
The top court was alarmed by the SNS and Internet messages that people were about to review the sensational cases with the fictitious portrayals of the characters in the movie ― the assailant professor as the victim of an unfair trial and the assaulted judge as an example of the erroneous exercise of legal authority.
Yet, as we look around, there are a rising number of judges who defied public trust in them with judgments unacceptable to common sense and by circulating nonsensical messages concerning current political affairs. Some even ridiculed the president using extremely vulgar expressions taken from Internet dialogues. Their comments, generally supporting leftist activism, have not only called their intellectual capacity into question but seriously harmed public trust in the legal community that has such individuals as members.
They assert freedom of expression as their basic rights as human beings and claim that their Twitter and Facebook accounts are a sacred space to exercise the individual rights. But these judges do not seem to understand that their wayward remarks make people doubt the depth and direction of their conscience and their ability to correctly interpret the law and apply it without any bias.
The legal maxim that “judges speak through their judgments” is being forgotten by a growing number of judges. When a judge tweets that the “gakaseki (meaning the president) is pro-American to the bone” and another claims that the Korea-U.S. free trade agreement is flawed, they are simply giving up public reliability. This kind of judges abandoning their sacred mission will be helping produce more movies of the likes of “Dogani” and “Broken Arrow” and raise their box office sales.
Our civil and criminal laws have provisions allowing the suitor and defendants to reject judges for the possibility of bias in particular cases. The system should be replenished so judges who made their ideological positions public through any means of communication can be ejected from the bench upon request from concerned parties.
