(LEAD) Lawmakers push for probe into sex crimes on disabled

(ATTN: UPDATES with lawmakers' comments in parliamentary session in paras 9, 11; minor edits in 12th para)
SEOUL, Oct. 12 (Yonhap) -- South Korean lawmakers are pushing for a parliamentary investigation into years-long sex crimes against disabled students that have recently emerged as a key social issue, a lawmaker said Wednesday.
The move came after a local box-office hit sparked a widespread public outrage against the sex crimes and the light punishments for the convicted teachers.
The film, "Dogani," whose English title is "The Crucible," is based on the shocking true story of teachers at a school in the southwestern city of Gwangju for the disabled who committed repeated sex crimes against hearing-impaired students for five years from 2000.
President Lee Myung-bak has recently called for measures to prevent such crimes from happening again after watching the movie.



The lawmakers submitted the request for a parliamentary probe to the National Assembly to look into the case and to come up with measures to prevent the recurrence of similar crimes.
"We need to thoroughly get to the bottom of the case," said Lee Jae-sun, a lawmaker of the minor opposition Liberty Forward Party, who initiated the request for the probe along with his fellow lawmakers. Some 80 lawmakers joined the campaign.
The looming parliamentary probe comes amid growing public calls for repealing the statute of limitations for child sex offenders.
Police have said law enforcement authorities cannot take legal actions against the suspects involved in the case as the statute of limitations had expired.
In a parliamentary interpellation session Wednesday, Shim Jae-chul, a lawmaker of the ruling Grand National Party, urged the government to remove the statute of limitations for sex offenders, citing the case of Japan, Britain and some U.S. states.
Six teachers were charged at that time, but only two received actual jail terms, each less than a year, with the others getting suspended terms and acquittals of charges.
Cho Jun-hyuk, another GNP legislator, claimed officials ranging from the special school authorities to police, prosecutors and presidential secretaries should assume legal and political responsibility for the sex crimes.
Also Wednesday, a children's foundation said it had collected signatures from more than 351,000 citizens in a public campaign to try to repeal the statute of limitations for sex offenders who target children. The foundation delivered the petition to the National Assembly.
A bill aimed at repealing the statute of limitations for sex offenders against children has been gathering dust in the National Assembly for more than a year.
entropy@yna.co.kr
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