She donated part of her liver in exchange for her son getting a job
A woman in her fifties has been fined by a district court in Korea after she offered to donate part of her liver to a company boss in exchange for him employing her son.
The promised liver transplant did not take place because the woman contracted COVID-19 shortly before the operation, and the head of the construction company, who was supposed to undergo the liver transplant, also died.
Recently, a judge at the Criminal Circuit of the Seoul Parkjeong-gil District Court ordered the woman to pay a fine of 3 million won (US$2,331) for violating the Organ Transplant Act.
According to the "Han Kori" website, last February, the woman heard from a friend that the manager of a large construction company was seriously ill and needed a liver transplant.
The friend linked her to an employee of the company concerned, who was the source of the information and coordinated the negotiation process between the donor and the son of the company's manager.
The two agreed that the woman would donate the liver in exchange for 100 million won (US$77,000) and secure a job for her son at the construction company, and the manager's son agreed to these terms.
On March 7, the woman entered a hospital in Seoul for examination before the organ was transferred.
She pretended to be the daughter-in-law of the director who was supposed to undergo the transplant, and a week later, the lady was approved as an organ donor by the National Institute of Organ, Tissue and Blood Management.
But after she was admitted to the hospital for the transplant, she was diagnosed with COVID-19, which caused a delay in the operation.
But as the woman's stay in the hospital continued, a nurse found her relationship with her caregivers to be suspicious and reported the charges of organ trafficking to the relevant authorities.
As a result, the surgery was cancelled.
To complicate matters further during the investigation and trial, the head of the construction company who was awaiting an eventual liver transplant died in July.
The sale of human organs is strictly prohibited under current Korean law.
The Organ Transplantation Act punishes anyone who promises to give or receive financial gain or other compensation in exchange for an organ, or who aids or abets another person to do so.
When the woman stood before the court, she asked for leniency on the grounds that she did not know that she was breaking the law and said, "I thought my son would be able to get a
job if the operation was successful. I also coveted the money."
The court ordered the woman to pay a fine of 3 million won and sentenced her two partners to six months in prison (suspended for two years) and a year in prison, respectively.
The court said it took "consideration of the small extent of her (the woman's) participation in the crime and the fact that she was not remunerated as promised after her surgery was delayed due to her diagnosis of COVID-19."
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