Pastor vividly recalls innocent victims' last words

[한겨레] Truth Commission and Supreme Court have upheld victims' innocence, Park Geun-hye still refuses apology

By Kim Ji-hoon, staff reporter

Rev. Park Jeong-il was present as a chaplain's aide at the 1975 execution of eight people in connection with the so-called People's Revolutionary Party incident. Speaking to the Hankyoreh on Sept. 11, the now 70-year-old Park declared the victims from the Committee for the Reestablishment of PRP were "true patriots." All responsibility for the incident, he said, lay with then-President Park Chung-hee.

"In terms of sheer decorum, Park Geun-hye should apologize to their surviving family members," he added, referring to the New Frontier Party presidential candidate and daughter of Park Chung-hee.

Park Geun-hye was previously asked during an interview on the MBC radio program "Son Suk-Hee's Spotlight" whether she intended to apologize to the PRP incident victims. Her response was, "Weren't there two Supreme Court verdicts on that? I think that matter should be left for history to decide".

On Apr. 8, 1975, Park Jeong-il, then 33, was a captain who headed the chaplain's office at the No. 1 Army Prison. At five o'clock that afternoon, he was heading home from work when he was contacted by the warden, who told him to report to headquarters.

He never imagined that what would happen next would be "something shocking, something I will never forget as long as I live."

The warden told him he was to attend an execution the next day as a religious officer. "For secrecy purposes, Army Prison personnel have been recruited," the warden explained. "You can't breathe a word of this, not even to your family." It was a troubling order.

It was only right before Park was setting out for Seodaemun Prison in Seoul that the warden told him, "These are the PRP executions. Take care of your responsibilities."

Riding with an army doctor in the military jeep provided by the warden, Park left the prison (located in Seongnam, Gyeonggi province) and arrived at an inn near Seodaemun Prison (today's Seoul Detention Center) around 7pm. He woke up at 3am the next day, finished his preparations and headed to the execution site at 4am. He saw six people there, including a judge advocate from Army headquarters and investigators from the prosecutors' office.

At 4:30, the first of the prisoners arrived, dressed in a white prison uniform. As he passed out of the early morning darkness into a room brightly lit with incandescent bulbs, he had a stunned expression on his face. The prisoner looked around for a moment before asking, "Where am I? What's going on?"

The judge advocate read the execution ruling and asked if the prisoner had any last words. Although somewhat bewildered, the prisoner was composed, as if he had been expecting it. When asked whether he wanted a prayer from the pastor, he quietly said, "I'm innocent. Everything will come out eventually."

The executioner put the rope around his neck. He pressed a button, and a board underneath the prisoner's feet gave way. The doctor came over to check that he was dead, and the body was removed.

The process took 30 minutes for each of the prisoners.

Not one of them confessed to any wrongdoing. One of them, when denied his request to see his son, he tried to buy some time by asking if he could smoke a cigarette, but even this was not allowed.

Before standing on the gallows, one prisoner said, "The caged bird dies unjustly, never having the chance to fly." Another said, "One day, this rotten government will collapse."

One face that Park recalls vividly is that of Lee Su-byeong. Before his execution, Lee said, "I have no choice but to oppose the Yushin regime, and I have no choice but to fight for democracy. Why must I die unjustly? We may be helpless victims now, but justice will bring the truth out!"

None of the prisoners asked Park for a prayer. He never spoke to any of them; he could only watch as they died. "I was so tense that I couldn't even pray for their eternal rest," he admitted.

After eight lives ended that morning, Park left the room at 8 a.m. and was handed a white envelope from the prison. The writing on it said it was a "special duties bonus."

"I suppose it was guilt, but I really felt conflicted about whether I should take it after doing such a thing," he said. "I just took it home with me."

Leaving the prison gates with the envelope in hand, he saw a group of family members and colleagues of the people who had been executed. They had already gotten word and were raging against the prison. Park slipped past the weeping survivors and away from the prison.

A graduate of the Methodist Theological University, Park joined the Army in 1969, serving for 15 years before being discharged as a major in 1984. He never met with family members of the PRP victims or worked to rehabilitate them, but he feels he did his part by telling the press about the circumstances of the time.

In September 9, the Presidential Truth Commission on Suspicious Deaths ruled the executions to have been based on false testimony extracted through torture, and in January 2007 Seoul Central District Court reheard the cases against the eight people implicated in the PRP case. The not-guilty ruling that followed was a case of "better late than never."

"They lost their lives unjustly, so I think it is right that the verdict should have been overturned so they were found not guilty," Park said. "I'm sure it must have been a great comfort to their families. Over the years, they've had to live in secret, ostracized and crushed by the world. . . ."

A longtime military man, Park identifies as a conservative and a supporter of the NFP, but he does think Park Geun-hye should apologize.

"Like many soldiers and former soldiers, I identify as conservative, but the victims of the PRP incident were true patriots," he said. "All responsibility for that episode lies with Park Chung-hee. My feeling is that in terms of sheer decorum, Park Geun-hye should apologize to their surviving family members."

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