Runaway convict arrested less than 4 hours before sentence loses effect

Prosecution investigators in Seoul arrested a runaway convict on Wednesday night at a warehouse in Gunpo, Gyeonggi Province. The arrest was made around at 8:30 p.m., less than four hours before his conviction sentence loses effect. The man, identified only as Choi, was indicted in December 2008 on charges of fraud. Choi, who has four previous convictions, allegedly failed to repay his credit card debt after purchasing an automobile worth more than 20 million won (20,000 U.S. dollars) on 36-month installments.

However, he ran away when his trial began. A local court proceeded with the trial without him and sentenced him to six months in prison.

A sentence of less than three years loses effect five years after it is concluded. Choi`s sentence was about to lose effect at 24:00 p.m. on Wednesday. While at large, he did not use a mobile phone or access the Internet at all. He also cut off all contacts even with his relatives.

The prosecution investigators attempted to arrest Choi in June, only to fail.

Having obtained the information that Choi had been working as a day worker at a logistics warehouse near Gunpo, they were on stakeout in the area and caught him while he was carrying delivery boxes. He was taken directly to a prison in Anyang, Gyeonggi Province. "We will arrest runaway convicts without fail to uphold the law," a prosecution official said.