[Anchor]

The investigation into suspicions that police falsely closed the case of a woman named Chang Mi-ran, who was found dead in Jeju about 100 days after being reported missing, is picking up speed. Police are focusing first on determining Chang's exact cause of death and examining the entire process of how the case was falsely closed.

Reporter An Huijae has the details.

[Reporter]

A woman wearing a hoodie leaves her accommodation.

This is the last known footage of the late Chang Mi-ran, who went missing in Jeju last May and was later found dead.

Based on mobile phone usage records and other data, police believe Chang went out around 10:15 PM on May 12 and died before dawn.

Regarding the cause of death, police stated they are investigating with all possibilities open, while repeatedly emphasizing that no signs of homicide, including evidence of a struggle, have been found so far.

The investigation into Police Officer Bu, affiliated with the Jeju Provincial Police Agency who falsely closed Chang's case, is also accelerating.

It has been found that after the initial missing person report for Chang was filed on May 15, Officer Bu closed the case by claiming he "spoke with her on the phone" and logged the reason on the internal network as having "died in a traffic accident." He was caught when police re-examined the relevant records after receiving a re-report two months later.

Police stated that they requested an investigation into Officer Bu on the 11th, immediately after recognizing the possibility of a false case closure.

Even after being detained, Officer Bu has reportedly continued to deny the allegations, claiming that he "exchanged contact with Chang."

It was confirmed that for the missing person case of a man in his 60s who was found dead after his case was falsely closed using a similar method, Officer Bu wrote down the reason for clearing the missing status as "location found."

Police plan to conduct a full review of 298 missing person cases handled by Officer Bu to check for any additional falsely closed cases.

(Video Editing: Ahn Yeo-jin)