There are many people dining with colleague after work mixed with alcohol, for example, a fun party eating pork belly with soju at night in Korea. After these crazy events, we often hear news of drunk drivers putting people’s lives at stake. However, despite these serious accidents, victim’s voices haven’t gotten much attention and there have been many denouncements pointing out that light punishment for offenders is just a slap on the wrist.

A man surnamed Park was accused of killing 22-year-old soldier Yun Chang-Ho while driving under the influence of alcohol. Park was charged with killing Yun in front of a crosswalk in Haeundae, Busan, while driving a BMW and having a blood alcohol content of 0.181 percent on September 25, 2018. His blood alcohol level far exceeded the 0.05 percent legal limit.

After the incident, Yun’s friends raised the issue of drunk driving, petitioning the presidential office website for stronger punishment regarding the misconduct of October 2 and gathering more than 400,000 signatures within a month. They held a press conference and visited lawmakers to demand a law revision against driving under the influence of alcohol. Yun died on a Friday, 46 days after he was left hospitalized and brain-dead. His death called for tougher punishments for drunk driving and now the “Yun Chang-Ho Law” has been established. Yun’s friends said, “Yun would’ve done the same thing if unfair incidents like this had happened to anyone else.”

As a result, the Korean national assembly made a revision of the traffic laws, strengthening the standard of suspension and revocation of license and establishing the new law of additional punishment when found guilty twice of drunk driving. The main content of the revision is that the inflictor now receives up to five years and at least two years in jail, or a penalty of up to 20 million won starting with at least 10 million won.

There is a national consensus that drunk driving is a serious crime and the citizens’ petition and Yun’s friends’ active intervention has accomplished this big change, which the Korean national assembly hadn’t been able to do for more than a decade. After the revision of the law, there are still numerous accidents killing people on the road by drunk driving. Everybody should keep the content of the revised law of “Yun Chang-Ho Law” in mind, and acknowledge the fact that drunk driving is a serious crime that could influence many people’s lives crucially.

L.L.F reporter Da-Won Ryu