Public outrage is growing as recordings of the perpetrators who assaulted the late movie director Kim Chang-min to death have been released. The recordings contain direct expressions like “I tried to kill him” and evidence of them mocking the police investigation.
According to a recent JTBC report, the main perpetrator, Mr. Lee, discussed the situation during a call with an accomplice, Mr. Lim, after being questioned by police on the day of the incident.
In the call, Lee said, “I kicked him to kill him, and when I went back and kicked him again, he seemed to be asleep, so I hit him again.” He also added, “I told him ‘Just die’ and delivered pounding punches.” Pounding punches are combat sports techniques used to unilaterally strike a fallen opponent.
Specifically, he repeatedly revealed his intent to kill, saying, “I felt like I had to kill him with my own hands; I had no other thought but to kill him.”
Another recording contains content mocking the police investigation. At the time, despite checking restaurant CCTV, the police excluded the accomplice, Mr. Lim, from the investigation based on Lee’s statement that “Lim tried to stop the assault.”
Regarding this, Lee told his accomplice in the call, “What’s freaking funny is that (the police) don’t even think the two of us did it.” He continued, “I testified that you just tried to stop it. I didn’t mention that you put him in a headlock inside,” revealing an attempt to cover up the crime.
These recordings were obtained through a search and seizure by a special prosecution team six months after the incident. The police had transferred the case without a search and seizure during the initial investigation, and the arrest warrant, which had been rejected twice, was only issued after the recordings were secured.
At the time of the incident, Director Kim was having a meal with his son, who has developmental disabilities, at a restaurant in Sutaek-dong, Guri-si, when he was group-assaulted after a dispute with a group of people who had been drinking.
According to JTBC, Director Kim was put into a “back choke” with both arms, fainted, was dragged into an alley, and assaulted about 20 times. His son with developmental disabilities witnessed the entire scene.
The assault only stopped when police arrived at 1:22 AM. Director Kim, who held on until just before losing consciousness, told the police one last thing before being loaded into an ambulance: “My son is inside the restaurant.”
After saying those words, Director Kim fell into a semi-coma within 30 minutes, and his condition worsened to the point where CPR was required. Eventually, he fell into a coma five days later.
Director Kim never regained consciousness and was declared brain-dead last November. He passed away after leaving new life to four people through organ donation.
The prosecution believes that the intent to kill is clearly revealed through these recordings. Accordingly, they plan to change the existing charge of “injury resulting in death” to “murder” for the indictment.
