A South Korean court on Thursday sentenced a former coach to ten and a half years in prison for sexually assaulting South Korean two-time gold medalist Shim Suk-hee. Olympic Games in short-track.
“The accused committed a sexual assault by coercion, repeatedly abusing the victim’s inability to protest against his trainer”, the Suwont district court ruled, according to the South Korean Yonhap news agency. Ms Shim had accused her ex-trainer Cho Jae-beom in January 2019 of sexually assaulting her for years when she was underage. Mr. Cho, already sentenced to 18 months in prison in January 2019 for beating Mrs. Shim for years, must now serve a total of 12 years in prison.
The 23-year-old Ms. Shim has four Olympic medals to her credit, including gold in the relay at the Sochi 2014 Olympics and at home in Pyeongchang.
The complaint, filed in January 2019 by the Olympic champion against her ex-coach, had caused a shock wave in the country.
South Korea is a regional sporting power, one of only two countries in Asia along with Japan to have hosted both the winter and summer games. He regularly appears in the table of the top ten Olympic medalists.
In an already ultra-competitive society, winning in the sports arena matters more than anything. Coaches have enormous power over the careers of young athletes. Physical and verbal abuse is common and those who report it are often condemned as “Traitors”.
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