[Anchor]
Twenty-six-year-old Kim Sung-woo, the suspect in the murder of his mother-in-law, has been handed over to the prosecutors' office on charges including retaliatory murder. He was also charged with stalking his wife 18 times around her residence prior to the crime, including during a period when a court-issued restraining order was in effect.
Reporter Jeong Jiyeon has the story.
[Reporter]
Twenty-six-year-old Kim Sung-woo, accused of murdering his mother-in-law and abducting his wife in Songpa-gu, Seoul, in the early hours of October 11, exits the police station with his face covered by a hat and mask.
[Kim Sung-woo: (Why did you kill your mother-in-law?) ... (Did you kill her for retaliation?) ...]
Kim, who was transferred to the prosecutors' office under arrest yesterday (October 20), reportedly stated to the police that he "committed the murder on the spur of the moment and put [his wife] in the car to talk to her."
However, the police applied charges of retaliatory murder and retaliatory confinement, which allow for aggravated punishment, rather than parricide.
The police stated that they factored in several circumstances: Kim's wife, surnamed A, had reported Kim for domestic violence last August and filed a lawsuit to annul their marriage; Kim purchased the weapon used in the crime near her family's home; and he had postponed a police interrogation scheduled for October 10, the day before the crime.
He was also slapped with additional stalking charges for loitering around A's residence a total of 18 times from September 16 until the day of the incident.
Of those instances, nine took place while a court-ordered temporary restraining order was in effect.
Regarding the hiring of a private detective agency during Kim's stalking campaign—first brought to light by an SBS report—police have secured relevant statements and are currently questioning individuals connected to the agency.
[Bereaved Family Member: (Heading toward Gangwon Province) While driving, [Kim] said that he paid 20 million won to a private detective agency for two weeks, deployed those people all around her sister's house, and checked all her locations.]
Kim is also accused of injuring two police officers by ramming into a pursuing patrol car while forcibly forcing A into a vehicle and fleeing toward Gangwon Province.
(Video by Kim Han-gyeol | Video Editing by Choi Hye-young | Design by Kim Ye-ji)
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