[Anchor]
A man in his 20s has been arrested by police on suspicion of murdering his mother-in-law and abducting his wife in a residential neighborhood in Seoul. The suspect was also under investigation for domestic violence. The brutal crime occurred just 11 days after the restraining order prohibiting him from approaching his wife expired.
First, reporter An Huijae has the details.
[Reporter]
In a dark, quiet residential alley during the early morning hours, a man dressed in black drags a woman away.
The woman struggles and calls out for help, but to no avail.
[Ah, mister.]
Police arrived and searched the surrounding area, but the two had already vanished.
[(Did you call 119?) A man dragged her away by her hair, this way.]
It was around 5:40 a.m. today (October 11) when a report was received that a woman in her 50s had been stabbed at a multi-family housing unit in Songpa-gu, Seoul.
A 26-year-old man, surnamed Kim, attacked his mother-in-law with a weapon.
The mother-in-law was rushed to the hospital but died.
[Nearby Resident: I heard cries of "Save someone," so I went outside and saw residents providing emergency first aid with towels...]
Right after the crime, Kim fled with his 23-year-old wife, surnamed A, in a vehicle. He was arrested by police seven hours later on a wooded mountain in Yangyang, Gangwon Province.
Wife A was also found nearby, and she reportedly did not sustain any major injuries.
SBS reporting confirmed that Kim, currently serving as a social service agent, had recently been under police investigation for domestic violence.
The two registered their marriage last February but were undergoing procedures to annul it when the wife reported the assault to police last August.
On September 2, police provided Wife A with a smart watch and placed her under personal protection measures, designating her case as having the highest risk of reoffending. However, this failed to prevent the tragedy.
The incident took place 11 days after the initial restraining order expired on September 30.
Police plan to investigate Kim regarding his motive and apply for an arrest warrant on charges of parricide and special confinement.
[Anchor]
Our reporter is stationed at the Songpa Police Station in Seoul, where the suspect has been brought. Let's go live to the scene.
Reporter Lim Jihyun, has the questioning begun?
[Reporter]
Yes. The suspect, who murdered his mother-in-law and fled to Yangyang, Gangwon Province, was brought here at 6:30 p.m., about an hour and a half ago.
[Kim / Mother-in-law Murder Suspect: (Do you have anything to say to the victim? Why did you flee from the scene?) I will explain everything during the investigation.]
Police located the wife first at around 10:30 a.m., about five hours after the incident occurred, and subsequently made an emergency arrest of Kim near that location at around 12:30 p.m., bringing him here.
Kim reportedly parted ways with his wife midway up the mountain, telling her, "Let's each go our separate ways."
Police are intensively investigating whether Kim committed the crime out of a grudge against his wife's family during the marriage annulment process.
They are also questioning him on whether the investigation into habitual domestic violence served as a motive, given that the crime occurred just a day after Kim failed to appear for a scheduled police summons yesterday (October 10).
[Anchor]
Despite the victim protection measures being in place, why did an incident like this happen again?
[Reporter]
Yes, police provided the wife with a personal protection smart watch on September 2.
It was a proactive measure based on assessments that Kim posed a high risk of reoffending. However, police investigation revealed that the smart watch had been powered off continuously since September 15.
Police suspect that the smart watch battery ran out due to a lack of charging activity.
At the same time, police added that, apart from the possibility of reoffending, because the wife showed no obvious external injuries, they did not deem the necessity of securing Kim's custody as immediately urgent.
However, while police were in the process of initiating procedures for an extension following the expiration of the restraining order late last month, Kim ended up committing the crime.
(Photo: Yonhap News)
(Video Reported by In Pil-sung, Cho Chang-hyun | Video Edited by Ahn Yeo-jin, Kim Jong-tae)
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