Inmates receive vocational training at a prison in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi Province. (Ministry of Justice)
Inmates receive vocational training at a prison in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi Province. (Ministry of Justice)

South Korea’s Supreme Court has upheld a seven-year prison sentence for an inmate convicted of causing the death of another prisoner by feeding him a lethal quantity of psychotropic medication, local media reported.

The top court recently found the defendant guilty of multiple offenses, including fatal injury, assault and abuse of psychotropic substances, in connection with the death of a male inmate in his 20s in 2024.

According to the ruling, the defendant assaulted the victim and forced him to swallow multiple pills, including the sedative-hypnotic substance zolpidem, at a vocational training correctional facility in Hwaseong, Gyeonggi Province, leading to acute poisoning and death.

The medication had been prescribed to the defendant for an anxiety disorder and provided by the prison’s medical unit.

Instead of taking the drugs himself, he stockpiled them, prosecutors said. They argued that as many as 25 doses were forced on the victim at once, while the court determined that at least 10 doses were likely ingested based on toxicology findings.

The defendant claimed he was trying to help relieve the victim’s muscle pain and auditory hallucinations, but other inmates testified that he forced the victim’s mouth open and made him take the pills.

“Forcing a person who does not take psychiatric medication to ingest a large amount of psychotropic drugs at once carries a high risk of fatal consequences,” a lower court said in the upheld ruling, adding that such consequences would be evident to almost anyone.


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