For 61 years, Choi Mal-ja lived with the weight of an unfair police conviction. She was 18 when she fought off an attempted rapist in Busan, South Korea, biting off part of his tongue to escape his assault. Choi was branded a criminal. In 1965, a court sentenced her to 10 months in prison for “aggravated bodily injury,” while her attacker served a suspended sentence for trespassing and intimidation.
This week, at age 79, she finally heard the words she had been waiting decades to hear: she was innocent. On Sept. 10, the Busan district court overturned her conviction, declaring that her actions had been justified self-defense. Standing outside the courthouse, Choi raised her voice in triumph. “I, Choi Mal-ja, am finally innocent!” she said, as supporters applauded.
Her case, buried for decades, has come roaring back in the wake of South Korea’s reckoning with gender-based violence and inequality. Inspired by the #MeToo movement, Choi began her push to clear her name in 2020. Her first request for a retrial was denied. But in 2023, the Supreme Court granted her a new hearing, opening the door for prosecutors themselves to apologize and ask for the original guilty verdict to be tossed.
The details of what happened to her in 1964 remain harrowing. Choi was thrown to the ground by a man who tried to rape her. According to court records, he forced his tongue into her mouth and clamped her nose to cut off her breathing. Desperate, she bit down, wounding him severely enough to break free. Weeks later, he and his friends tracked her down, threatening her family with violence. Yet when the case reached trial, prosecutors dropped attempted rape charges against him and focused instead on punishing her.
The court’s reasoning at the time—that biting off part of his tongue went beyond “reasonable bounds” of self-defense—speaks to an era when women’s safety and dignity were often dismissed. For Choi, it meant living more than half a century with the stigma of being officially labeled an offender, not a survivor.
“Sixty-one years ago, in a situation where I could understand nothing, the victim became the perpetrator and my fate was sealed as a criminal,” Choi told reporters after her acquittal. “For the victims who shared the same fate as mine, I wanted to be a source of hope for them.”
Her lawyers say they will now seek compensation from the state for the harm she endured, including prison time, lost opportunities, and a lifetime under a false judgment.
It took more than six decades, but justice has finally arrived. For Choi Mal-ja, her name has been restored. For South Korea, her story is a reminder that the law’s failures can last generations—and that sometimes, even belatedly, they can be undone.
