Park Sung-joo and his subordinates are accused of ordering separate investigations for the murder and rape crimes committed by suspect Jang Yoon-gi, despite repeated recommendations from frontline police to combine the cases. ^[1] The Gwangju District Prosecutors Office indicted former Korea National Investigation Chief Park Sung-joo and three other officials on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of rights. ^[2] Prosecutors indicted Park Sung-ju, former head of the National Office of Investigation under the National Police Agency, on Wednesday for allegedly obstructing an investigation into a high-profile murder case in Gwangju. ^[3] Suspect Jang Yoon-gi was initially charged with simple murder, but prosecutors later supplemented the investigation to charge him with rape-murder and sought the death penalty. ^[4] Park allegedly gave orders to separate the cases despite repeated suggestions to the contrary from front-line police officers, apparently out of fear that combining the cases would expose the police's failure to stop the suspect from committing additional crimes. ^[5] Park Sung-ju was charged with abuse of power for allegedly ordering separate investigations into a suspect's stalking and rape case and his subsequent murder case. ^[6] Park's order prevented the Gwangju Gwangsan Police Station from properly examining the rape and murder charges against Jang, leading the police to refer him to the prosecution on a simple murder charge, which carries a far lighter sentence than the minimum life imprisonment handed down for rape-murder. ^[7]