The director of a disciplinary labor center in Onsong County, North Hamgyong Province, has been removed from his position after having an “inappropriate relationship” with a female prisoner and providing her with special benefits.

“A female prisoner who had been sent there for drug smuggling charges had relations with the head of the facility,” said a source from the area on December 7. “The camp director exempted her from forced labor. He was removed from his position on November 20.”

Disciplinary labor centers (rodong dallyondae) house offenders who have committed relatively light offenses. Inmates generally spend a couple of months working at these facilities. Recently, police stations have started using the camps to house accused criminals prior to the start of their investigations.

The female inmate in question was accused of smuggling North Korean drugs into China, but the police had yet to begin a full investigation into the charges. She was thus being held temporarily in the labor center. Local police are now shifting the direction of the investigation to rumors that officials have been involved, a separate source in North Hamgyong Province reported.

“The woman is very clearly attractive. The head of the center committed a serious crime by having relations with her, exempting her from forced labor and even allowing her to leave the camp at times,” he said.

The local police station had sent a vehicle to pick the woman up for her investigation, but she was not there at the time. This caused alarm to spread among the police and she was ultimately arrested near the camp. The police then reported the incident to their superiors.

A separate source in North Hamgyong Province added that during the course of the investigation, it was found that the woman was persuaded to have sexual relations with the director in exchange for him “getting her released after a chat” with his superiors. The camp director is likely to receive punishment due to witnesses seeing him allowing the woman to leave the camp.

“The camp director is rumored to have had a lot of complicated and inappropriate relationships with female inmates in the past,” she said. “He will be punished because he committed actions that went above and beyond a normal relationship with a female inmate.”