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| Former teacher at Sookmyung Girls' High School is walking to the courtroom to stand trial for his charge of 'obstruction of business' at the Seoul Central District Court in Seoul, Thursday. / Yonhap |
By Kim Jae-heun
A court found a former teacher at Sookmyung Girls' High School guilty Thursday of illegally providing exam questions to his twin daughters attending the same school, prior to them sitting the test.
The Seoul Central District Court sentenced the father, surnamed Hyeon, to three-and-a-half years in prison for "obstruction of business."
"It is beyond description how much the teacher has obstructed the school's business by committing the crime over two semesters. His misdeed has led the public to suspect other high schools' management of their students' test records, something that requires transparency and fairness for college admissions," the court said in its ruling.
"As a result, the people's trust in public education was negatively affected as was other teachers' morale. The accused, however, continues to deny the charge despite trying to destroy evidence. Therefore, the court must give him a severe punishment."
The prosecution had earlier requested seven years in prison, but the court rejected this saying the high school was partially responsible as it failed to adopt a system to prevent such "leaks" in advance. "Also this incident has affected his twin daughters who now cannot live a normal life as students, which the father probably had wanted the least."
The former teacher was indicted for leaking exam papers five times, thereby helping his two daughters to cheat on tests from the first semester of their freshman year in 2017 to the first semester of their sophomore year in 2018.
As a result, the two girls' grade ranking put them at the top of their class, jumping from 50th and 100th places in a single year.
Hyeon and the girls have denied the cheating and claimed they only studied hard to obtain such good rankings.
The court did not accept these claims, saying the twins' scores did not improve in tests organized by other institutes.
The girls are also on trial in another court dealing with cases involving minors.
