Court orders state compensation in cold case of master sergeant’s death

A Seoul court has ordered the state to pay 90 million won (US$64,808) in compensation to the bereaved family of an Army master sergeant whose death became a cold case due to a flawed military investigation, judicial officials said Monday. In 2001, a master sergeant surnamed Yeom, affiliated with a mechanized Army infantry division, was beaten to death with a blunt weapon while returning home after a drinking session with a warrant officer of the same unit and a sergeant first class from the Defense Security Command. A jujube tree branch smeared with Yeom's blood was later found near the location of his body, while forensic analysis revealed that two cigarette butts found on a nearby roadside matched the DNA of the other two military officials. They were subsequently identified as suspects. The military police investigating the case, however, excluded the cigarette butts as evidence and accepted their alibi that they were playing billiards at the time. After 15 years, police launched a re-investigation fol lowing the 2015 enforcement of a law abolishing the statute of limitations for murder, ultimately booking the two men on the grounds of a fabricated alibi. However, as the investigation gained traction, one of them, accused of directly beating Yeom to death, was found dead in his car with a burned charcoal briquette. The other accused individual subsequently had his charges cleared by prosecutors due to insufficient evidence, prompting the victim's bereaved family to file a damages suit against the state in 2018. The family claimed that the "truth of the case remains undiscovered" for a long period due to the military police and the police's poor handling of the investigation. The Seoul Central District Court recently ruled in favor of the bereaved family, citing "serious flaws" in the investigation and holding the poor investigation responsible for the case going cold. Source: Yonhap News Agency