Since December 18th, 2018, with the revision of the Act on the Aggravated Punishment, etc. of Specific Crimes and the revision of the Road Traffic Act, the so-called Yoon Chang-ho Act, the punishment for drunk driving got stricter. However, the increasing number of drunk driving accidents overshadow the act. According to the Korean National Police Agency, compared to 2019, the drunk driving accidents and injuries in 2020 increased 9.8% and 8.1%, respectively. To prevent those, the punishment for drunk driving should be strengthened.

        First, the criteria for punishment is ambiguous. The revision of the Act on the Aggravated Punishment, etc. of Specific Crimes was made by strengthening prison sentences and monetary penalties for the Crime of the Fatal Intoxicated Driving. By the law, those who drive a car impaired and injure someone, get punished. However, even though a drunk driving accident happened, the act is not applied if it is judged that normal driving was possible. The Korean Institute of Criminology Researcher Soung Jea-hyen argued the act should certainly be applied at least when a driver with a blood alcohol content (BAC) higher than the standard for license suspension caused an accident. Second, habitual drunk driving is increasing because it is easy to reacquire one’s driving license. According to the Korean National Police Agency and the Korea Transportation Safety Authority’s drunk driving recidivism data, it was 43.7% in 2019 but increased to 46.4% in the 1st half of 2020. After the license acquisition restriction period, a special transportation safety education is required to reacquire one’s license. Those who drove drunk once must attend for 6 hours, two times must attend for 8 hours, and after drunk driving 3 or more times must receive 16 hours of education. The Samsung Traffic Safety Research Institute Head Researcher Lim Chae-hong explained that in Korea, people can reacquire the license by just attending 16 hours of education at most, while foreign countries do drinking rehabilitation programs for 3 months to 5 years. Third, the level of prison sentence and monetary penalty punishment for drunk driving is light. In November 2020, on the Blue House National Petition site, about 240,000 people signed a petition[1] about the necessity of a stronger level of drunk driving punishment. In Korea, the standard for license suspension is from 0.03% to 0.08% of BAC, and license revocation with a BAC of 0.08% or more. In case of a drunk driving injury accident, the punishment is at least a year, to at most 15 years in prison, or a fine of 10-30 million won[2]. However, in Brazil, even with a BAC of 0.01%, a monetary penalty and license suspension for a year is imposed. Also, if a drunk driving injury occurs, murder is charged regardless of accident severity. In Japan, not only drunk drivers but also the drinking party gets punished and in Australia, drunk drivers’ information is disclosed in the newspaper. Korea should strictly regulate drunk driving to make drivers more aware of the seriousness of drunk driving.

        Despite the implementation of the Yoon Chang-ho Act, the number of drunk driving accidents are increasing. Korea has to make the punishment tougher than the current state. Let’s strengthen the drunk driving punishment and prevent any more victims.

[1] “A 28-Year-Old Died While Crossing a Crosswalk Due to a Car Accident Caused by a Drunk Driver.”

[2] Data by the KoROAD