This Feb. 23, 2021, file photo shows police officers conducting a DUI checkpoint on a road in southern Seoul. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, May 26 (Korea Bizwire) – The Constitutional Court ruled Thursday that a law calling for aggravated punishment against repeated offenses of drunk driving or refusing field sobriety testing is unconstitutional.
The nine-justice panel made the ruling in a 7-2 vote to a clause of the country’s revised Road Traffic Act, dubbed the Yoon Chang-ho act, named after a victim of a high-profile DUI case. A vote of two-thirds is required to reverse a ruling.
The controversial law, revised in 2020, has lost its validity following the ruling.
The clause states that those committing DUIs or refusing to take a breathalyzer test for a combined two or more times, or those refusing the test two or more times should be put behind bars between two and five years or face a fine of between 10 million won and 20 million won (US$7,896-US$15,792).
The court ruled that aggravated punishment for multiple violations is excessive, saying it is too much to label a repeat drunk driving offender when the interval between the two offenses is considerably long.
Last year, the Constitutional Court made a similar ruling and delivered a non-constitutional decision against another clause of the Road Traffic Act.
(Yonhap)
