[Anchor]

As prosecutors formally indicted the suspect in the Paju freezer storage murder case, they concluded that the crime was a meticulously planned offense targeting billions of won in penalty fees. They determined that everything—from preparing counterfeit gift certificates and a freezer storage in advance to targeting an elderly woman—was planned.

Reporter Yoo Soo-Hwan has the details.

[Reporter]

He had no intention to kill, and broker Mr. A, who brokered the department store gift certificate transaction, also knew about the forgery. This was the claim made by 39-year-old suspect Shin, the perpetrator of the Paju freezer storage murder case, during police investigations.

However, the prosecutors, who took over the case in mid-September, secured a recorded phone call file through smartphone forensics in which Shin mentioned the crime plan even before meeting Mr. A.

The content revealed that after killing the person who came to check the counterfeit department store gift certificates, the suspect intended to make the victim disappear along with the gift certificates and extract billions of won in penalty fees from the buyer side.

Prosecutors concluded that the entire crime was premeditated, pointing to the 50 billion won worth of counterfeit department store gift certificates prepared a month in advance, the large freezer storage installed a week prior, and the demand made a day before for an elderly woman to be sent to inspect the gift certificates.

Shin, who ran a large cafe and accumulated over 1 billion won in debt, focused more on a contingency plan for when the forgery was discovered—though the suspect would pocket the transaction proceeds if the deal went through without the forgery being detected.

As a result, the victim, who had no idea it was a premeditated crime and believed she only needed to verify the gift certificates, was trapped in a minus-25-degree Celsius (minus-13-degree Fahrenheit) freezer storage for 27 hours and found dead.

Prosecutors concluded that it was a solo crime, stating that the individuals pointed out by Shin as accomplices during the police investigation had no knowledge of the counterfeit gift certificates or the murder plan.

Prosecutors indicted Shin on October 1 while in custody, applying charges including murder of an abducted person, and the forgery and uttering of securities.

Video by Kim Ho-jin