A man who killed his live-in girlfriend and hid the body under cement for 16 years was sentenced to 14 years in prison.
According to legal sources on the 29th, the Supreme Court's First Division (presiding Justice Shin Suk-hee) recently finalized the lower court ruling that sentenced a person surnamed Kim (59) to 14 years in prison for murder and to 2 years and 6 months for violating the Narcotics Control Act (psychotropic).
Kim was found to have beaten the victim in the head and face multiple times with a blunt object during a dispute over a romantic issue in an attic room of a multi-family house in Geoje, South Gyeongsang, in Oct. 2008, causing death; the victim was in their 30s at the time.
Kim is accused of placing the victim's body in a travel bag and pouring cement on the outdoor veranda of the attic at the residence to bury it. Kim stacked bricks around the hiding spot and poured about 10 centimeters of cement to disguise it as a normal part of the house structure. It was later found that Kim lived in the home where the crime occurred for about eight years until being detained on drug charges in 2016.
It was nearly buried as a "perfect crime," but in Aug. last year, a worker breaking up a concrete structure for leak repair dug into the veranda and, 16 years after the crime, brought the body to light.
Kim was also indicted last year on charges of injecting methamphetamine multiple times.
The first trial court said, "The victim likely ended life amid extreme physical and mental pain and fear, and the victim's bereaved family is petitioning for severe punishment for A," and sentenced 14 years in prison for murder. The court also said, "Kim has a prior conviction of imprisonment for a narcotics crime," and sentenced 2 years and 6 months in prison for violating the Narcotics Control Act.
Kim appealed, saying the sentence was too heavy, and prosecutors filed a cross-appeal, saying it was too light. However, the appeals court dismissed both sides' appeals. The Supreme Court also found the appellate judgment to be correct and dismissed the appeal.