Military judge frees King for good behavior and time served after sentencing him to 12 months in prison.
US soldier Travis King, who fled to North Korea and was detained there, was sentenced to one year in prison and then released based on time already served, according to his lawyer.
King pleaded guilty to five charges, including desertion, assault on a noncommissioned officer and three counts of disobedience to an officer, as part of a plea deal that was accepted Friday by a military judge at Fort Bliss, Texas, his attorney Franklin Rosenblatt said.
The soldier faced at least 14 charges, including desertion, assault and solicitation of child pornography, filed by the U.S. Army under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
The government decided to dismiss nine charges after he pleaded guilty to five counts.
King was stationed in South Korea and was supposed to return to Texas last year to face disciplinary hearings after spending nearly two months in a South Korean jail on assault charges following a drunken bar fight.
Instead, he left the airport and crossed the border from South Korea into North Korea in July 2023 while on a civilian sightseeing tour of the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) that divides the Korean Peninsula.
He was immediately taken into North Korean custody.
“The judge, under the terms of the plea agreement, sentenced Travis to one year of confinement, reduction in rank to private (E-1), forfeiture of all pay and allowances, and dishonorable discharge,” Rosenblatt said in a statement.
“Travis has already served his sentence and has received recognition for his good conduct, so he is now free and will return home,” the statement said.
North Korea then said King, who joined the military in January 2021, had defected to escape “mistreatment and racial discrimination in the U.S. military.”
But after completing its investigation, Pyongyang “decided to expel” King for illegally invading its territory, and he was returned to US custody in September 2023.
In a statement, the U.S. Army's Office of Special Counsel confirmed King's guilty plea as part of a deal.
“The outcome of today’s court-martial is a fair and just result that reflects the seriousness of the crimes committed by Trooper King,” Senior U.S. Attorney Allyson Montgomery said in a statement.
King's attorney, Rosenblatt, said the soldier “faced significant challenges throughout his life, including a difficult upbringing, exposure to criminal environments and struggles with mental health,” adding that these factors “compounded the difficulties he faced in the military.”
