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A memorial for a 16-month-old child who died from child abuse in Yangpyeong County, Gyeonggi Province. (Yonhap News)

In October 2013, eight-year-old Seo-hyeon was found dead in a bathtub in her Ulsan home. Beatings from her stepmother had broken 16 of her ribs. The following February, the South Korean government announced response measures — but nothing has changed. According to official government data (2019 stats on child abuse from the Ministry of Health and Welfare), deaths resulted from child abuse totaled 38 in 2017, 28 in 2018, and an estimated 42 in 2019.

The Korean government tabulated that 30,045 children were victims of abuse in 2019.

On Oct. 13, 2020, seven years after Seo-hyeon’s death, a 16-month-old girl named Jeong-in died at a hospital in Seoul’s Yangcheon District. The cause of death was “blunt force trauma to the abdomen.”

Once again, the government has hurriedly rolled out preventive measures, but the public hasn’t found them convincing. Experts argue that, rather than stopgap solutions, the time has come to reinforce the child protection system that’s already in place to ensure that it gets the job done.

Public anger over the Jeong-in incident has been compounded by government failure to prevent her death despite three reports of potential child abuse. Following her death, the police and the Ministry of Health and Welfare hurriedly announced that the authorities would immediately remove children from the home when they receive at least two reports of child abuse and find bruises or other injuries on the children’s bodies.

But such standards may be difficult to apply on the ground. The fact is that if parents deny that abuse has occurred, immediate separation isn’t feasible. When bruises were spotted on Jeong-in’s leg in May 2020, the police questioned her adoptive parents but closed the case after the parents denied abuse and claimed that the bruises had been caused by a massage.

“When the abusive parents are firm in their denial, it’s not easy to demonstrate that abuse has occurred. We have a decent system, but what’s most important is expertise, adequate experience, and the determination of the officers in charge,” said Lee Bae-geun, head of the Korea Association for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect.

There are also concerns that an overemphasis on the number of reports may create blind spots. Even a single instance of serious abuse requires immediate action, but insisting on a fixed number could create an excuse for not doing so.

“In June 2020, there was a case of child abuse in Cheonan, South Chungcheong Province, in which the child eventually died even though only one report had been filed. Rather than focusing on the criteria for immediate separation, we need to figure out why those criteria aren’t working,” said Kim Ye-won, head of the Disability Rights Advocacy Center.

What happens after a child has been removed from an abusive home is also important. After separation, children stay at a foster home or a shelter for victims of child abuse.

But at present, Korea only has 75 shelters for such children. Assuming that each shelter can accommodate five to seven children, national shelters have a maximum capacity of about 500 children.

While the number of shelters is slated to increase to 91 this year, that’s not nearly enough, considering that there were 30,045 cases of child abuse in 2019.

“We need to make sure that no children have to stay with an abusive family because there isn’t enough space at our facilities. While working to expand the facilities, we also need to think about ways to use de facto child protection facilities that already exist in local communities,” Lee Bae-geun said.

One of the main measures for preventing child abuse that the government has taken recently is putting government employees in charge of cases of child abuse. Since October 2020, these child protection officers have been assigned to local governmental bodies, where they are responsible for investigating alleged child abuse and determining whether abuse occurred.

The private organizations that had formerly been responsible for those tasks had faced numerous limitations, including the difficulty of questioning uncooperative parents. That’s why the job was transferred to the public sector. Last year, 290 child protection officers were assigned to 188 cities, counties, and districts around the country to handle cases of child abuse.

By its very nature, child protection work requires a high degree of expertise, but the system makes it hard to guarantee expertise. The most recently assigned third batch of officers began their duties following a week of classes, which were held online because of COVID-19.

“Employees at the child protection organizations were sent to the field after 100 hours of training, but we only get about two weeks of training. It’s really tough since this is an area where experience can help you resolve a lot of issues,” said a child protection officer working in Seoul.

“It would be ideal to assign people who have studied child abuse or who have experience [in the field], but it seems as if some of the people being assigned lack experience,” said an official with the city of Seoul.

There’s also a severe shortage of staff. Child protection officers are expected to work around the clock, fielding reports, paying home visits, taking emergency measures, and connecting children with professional organizations. As of Jan. 4, there were 61 child protection officers working in Seoul’s 25 districts: an average of 2.4 officers per district.

“There need to be at least three people on staff — two to make home visits and one to field reports,” a city official said.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare is planning to field a total of 664 child protection officers around the country this year.

There’s also a critical need for the police to expand their staff and improve their expertise.

“When [a station] has two or three officers in charge of abuse prevention, they’re responsible for handling abuse not only against children but also against all vulnerable groups, including the elderly, women, and people with disabilities. In some cases, a single officer is in charge of hundreds of cases,” said a senior manager with the police.

Another problem, the manager said, is that officers are frequently reassigned, preventing them from building up expertise about their work.

To keep other children from ending up like Jeong-in, experts say, it’s necessary to create an environment that encourages child protection officers to do a good job.

“The child protection service today looks okay on the surface but is actually understaffed and underfunded. It’s like having a car with no gas in the tank. If the government really wants to make child protection a public service, as it says, child protection officers ought to receive the requisite training and treatment,” said Kang Ji-yeong, a professor of child welfare at Sookmyung Women’s University.

“This is extremely professional work that requires a lot of education and experience. But the shortage of workers makes the job exhausting, causing even more workers to quit. That means you have constant turnover, which keeps staff from gaining expertise,” said Jeong Ik-jung, a professor of social welfare at Ewha Womans University.

By Kang Jae-gu, Jeon Gwang-joon, and Yi Ju-been, staff reporters

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