Guilty verdict upheld for man who bit off woman’s tongue

A Seoul appellate court said Monday it has upheld a lower court’s guilty verdict for a man who bit off part of a woman’s tongue as she tried to forcibly kiss him during a drunken night-out.

The Seoul High Court sentenced the 23-year-old man, identified only by his surname Kim, to six months behind bars with a one-year stay of execution for seriously injuring the woman during a binge drinking session one night in June 2013.

The court said Kim’s act doesn’t constitute self-defense as he could have pushed her away or sought other, less violent means to stop her.

“Kim’s act goes beyond the norms of our society, so his claim of self-defense is not justifiable,” Judge Kim Sang-hwan said.

The woman’s injury was “serious,” as her tongue swells when she eats hot or spicy food, the judge said, adding the injury has impaired her speech.

The woman, who is an acquaintance of Kim’s girlfriend, was among the group that went drinking with Kim and his girlfriend on the night of the incident.

Court documents showed that the woman tried to kiss Kim when he was passed out on the floor drunk at 4 a.m. She lost 2 centimeters of her tongue when Kim bit her, an act he claimed was in self-defense.

The court, however, reduced the lower court’s one-year jail term with a two-year stay of execution, saying Kim was dead drunk, which probably impaired his sense of reason and judgment. (Yonhap)