Sex offender ordered to pay restitution to child

A 29-year-old therapist who was convicted of sexually molesting a young boy suffering from domestic abuse was ordered by a local court to pay 30 million won ($25,000) in restitution.

The man, whom authorities only identified by his surname, Kim, was ordered to pay 25 million won to the victim, now 9, and the remainder to the boy’s father, according to a ruling handed down by the Uijeongbu District Court in Gyeonggi.

The verdict, delivered Friday, stated that the victim had been molested at a time when he was in critical need of attention from society and that the mental anguish Kim inflicted had aggravated the boy’s psychological state.

Last month, in a separate criminal suit filed against Kim, he was sentenced to three years in prison with a five-year suspension, along with three years of supervision and 40 hours of sexual violence therapy.

The victim was 7 years old when Kim groped his genitals and buttocks during a camping trip hosted in 2014 by Good Neighbors, a group dedicated to protecting the rights of children; Kim was working for the organization as the head of its counseling team.

The young boy was first introduced to Good Neighbors in May 2014 by another group that was aware he was being physically abused by his father.

In June that year, Kim convinced the boy to join an overnight camping program and groped him at night while the child was asleep. It was later discovered that several hours before the incident, Kim had taken photographs of the child naked in the shower with his mobile phone. The victim’s father called police after the boy returned home and complained of pain.

BY JEON ICK-JIN, LEE SUNG-EUN [lee.sungeun@joongang.co.kr ]