Article 14-2 of the former Act on the Punishment of Sexual Crimes and Protection, etc. of Victims Thereof (amended by Act No. 8059, Oct. 27, 2006) provides that “Any person who takes pictures against his will another person’s body which may cause sexual humiliation or shame using a camera or other similar mechanism shall be punished by imprisonment for not more than five years or by a fine not exceeding 10 million won.” However, the latter part of Article 14-2 of the former Act on Special Cases Concerning the Punishment, etc. of Sexual Crimes (amended by Act No. 8059, Oct. 27, 2006; hereinafter referred to as “the former Act on Special Cases Concerning the Punishment, etc. of Sexual Crimes”) was amended by adding the latter part of the same Act to “a person who takes pictures against his will or distributes, sells, leases, or openly displays or shows its taken pictures, shall be punished by imprisonment for not more than five years or by a fine not exceeding 10,000 won.”

In light of the language and text of the instant provision itself, “a person who distributes, sells, leases, or openly displays or shows photographs,” and the legislative purport of the instant provision is to punish only a person who photographs another’s body against his will, which might cause sexual humiliation or shame by using a camera, etc. prior to the amendment, but only punished the person who photographs another’s body against the victim’s will. However, in consideration of the social problems causing severe damage and pain to the victim by widely spreading photographs of another’s body through an information and communications network such as the Internet, the person who distributes, sells, leases, openly displays, or shows photographs shall not be the same as the person who taken pictures, and shall not be the subject of taking pictures.

In the same purport, the court below is just in holding that the crime of violation of the provision of this case is established in the case of distributing, selling, leasing, openly displaying or screening photographs taken against another person's body against the latter's will, even though the latter did not directly take such photographs, and contrary to the allegations in the grounds of appeal, the court below did not err by failing to exhaust all necessary deliberations and exceeding the bounds of the principle of free evaluation of evidence against logical and empirical rules, or by misapprehending the legal principles as to the violation of the Sexual Violence Punishment Act (Use of Camera, etc.).

Therefore, the appeal is dismissed. It is so decided as per Disposition by the assent of all participating Justices on the bench.

Justices Kim Yong-deok (Presiding Justice)