Original article in Korean is at this link.

35-year-old Mr. Jeong, a television producer, has been to the Seoul Central District Courts over 30 times since 1998. To get there he takes the bus from Seocho-dong. With his dream of being a movie director, he said that: “I think it helps me come up with all kinds of directorial ideas and scenarios.” Four or five times a month he clears his schedule to attend criminal court sessions.

“Unlike television and film, you’re seeing reality itself. There was one defendant, a young person who had burgled a wealthy family in Gangnam in order to get money for powdered milk. The defendant’s mother came to the court to beg for mercy, and wept  as if she were losing an infant child. Although it produced a short news article, I saw a deep human drama.”

The “court mania” currently happening in Japan is now sweeping into Korea.

The recent popular movies “The Case of Itaewon Homicide” (2009), “The Client” (2011), and “Unbowed” (2011) were all courtroom dramas, and the number of people who want to see the spectacle of justice is increasing. The “shadow jury” (그림자 배심원) is also popular. The program allows people to be shadow jurors, following a case as if they were real jurors, and decide whether the defendant is guilty or innocent. Over the past year, 567 people have participated in the Seoul Central District Courts alone.

A spokesman for People Power 21′s judiciary center (참여연대 사법감시센터) said that: “over 350 people have participated in the judicial project formed in our organization… 80% are law school students or preparing for the bar exam, and the rest are ordinary pe

35-year old Min Jun-ho, who teaches a class on “Law and Society” in a test-preparation hagwon, has been going to courts for the last four years. Every time he goes, Mr. Min is accompanied by 20 to 30 teenagers from his classes. He said that: “the court is a space where we can see the two extremes of our society through one eye… through watching the judges and prosecutors, who have studied hard and become an elite, and the defendants who committed crimes and been knocked to the bottom of society, students can feel many things.”

“It’s so popular that students from the provinces will take highway buses to come watch, and when we saw a case where a father was murdered to save the mother from his abuse, everyone wept. It was difficult even for the court-appointed defense counsel.”

68-year old Shillim-dong resident Roh Byeong-su, who was in the Seoul Central District Court on the 7th, said that: “when I’m just killing time I don’t just go to court… through a retired friend of mine in the neighborhood I got to know how interesting it is to go to court… criminal trials are particularly interesting because of the joy, anger, sorrow, and emotion.”

On the internet people have written posts saying for example: “on the suggestion of a friend of mine who also majors in legal studies, I took my girlfriend on a date to the Busan High Court to see a case of marital rape.” Another post said: “I like criminal investigations, so I want to see the court, can anyone just go in?” Recently a website has appeared that analyzed the 석궁 테러 사건 case with an expert level of understanding. In Japan some people have started to work as “court freelancers” for magazines and other media outlets focused on courts, and television shows have been based on the “court mania” phenomenon.

One judge in the Seoul Central District Courts said that: “recently there have been many people to court who do not appear to be journalists or to have relationships to the parties, and they pay very close attention… although it makes me feel I am being scrutinized and there may be shouts and insults in a high-profile case, I see it as a part of the process of society becoming more transparent.”