An American soldier accused of fleeing a fatal traffic accident was in the custody of local authorities in the first case under a new deal that gives South Korea greater authority over US troops accused of committing crimes here, officials said yesterday.
Sergeant Jerry Onken, 33, of Onamia, Minnesota, is accused of leaving the scene of a collision near the capital Seoul that killed a 22-year-old Korean woman in November. He had been held in US custody but was sent to a South Korean detention center in Seoul last week, US Eighth Army spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Steven Boylan said.
Onken, who was off-duty at the time of the accident, is the first US soldier to be handed over to South Korean authorities for custody before trial. Surrendering troops to South Korean courts for pretrial jailing was part of a 2001 revision of the Status of Forces Agreement, Boylan said.
The agreement, which covers the 37,000 US soldiers stationed in South Korea, gives Seoul primary jurisdiction over US soldiers accused of certain crimes committed when off duty. The offenses include murder, arson, rape and fleeing a deadly traffic accident.
The US military maintains jurisdiction over troops who commit crimes while on duty.
Onken is the first suspect to fall within the agreement since it was revised, Boylan said.
Last month, a South Korean court issued an arrest warrant for Onken, who is a member of the 1-43 Air Defense Artillery Battalion based in Suwon.
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