ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, August 26, 1996 TAG: 9608260136
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA
Former military strongmen Chun Doo-hwan and Roh Tae-woo were found guilty of mutiny and treason today. Chun was sentenced to death while Roh was given 22 1/2 years in prison.
A three-judge panel found the two ex-presidents guilty of staging a coup 17 years ago, then causing hundreds of deaths in a violent crackdown on a pro-democracy uprising six months later.
The verdicts and sentences closed the first chapter in what media here had dubbed ``the trial of the century,'' an examination of one of the darkest eras in South Korea's modern history.
Chun's death sentence is subject to automatic appeal. Roh's attorneys were also expected to appeal his sentence.
The prosecution demanded Chun be sentenced to death and Roh to life imprisonment. Chun and Roh ruled South Korea in the 1980s and the early 1990s.
Even if Chun's death sentence is upheld by the country's highest court, execution is rare in South Korea and it is unlikely the sentence would be carried out.
- Associated Press
LENGTH: Short : 32 linesby CNB