Murder Conviction Given Without Victims Body
By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter
The Supreme Court convicted a man of murdering his wife even though her body has not been found.
The top court upheld a high court ruling that handed down an 18-year jail term to a man in his 60s, whose name was not disclosed, for killing his wife. He was charged with murdering her at his home in Daejeon on April 20 last year and dismembering and dumping her body.
The wife went missing sometime after she was recorded entering home on CCTV of the apartment building around 1 p.m. Two days later, the husband was shown in the CCTV recording, with five garbage bags, which he loaded into his car before leaving.
Police failed to find the corpse, but suspected him as the murderer, considering that traces of her blood were found in the house; human skin tissue and pieces of bone were found in the drain of the bathtub; and he used 5 tons of tap water in six days from April 21 to 26.
The man claimed his wife left home. The prosecution confirmed the wife had filed a divorce suit a month before, citing the husband's violence and mistrust.
``Without a body, there is no direct evidence of her murder. However, we can acknowledge that she was dead, considering her blood and human bones were found in the house. It seems that he killed her and disposed of the body, considering he moved the garbage bags somewhere,'' the court said in the ruling.
``Although such indirect evidence does not completely prove a crime, we can conclude a crime took place if the evidence shows it,'' it said.
The latest ruling is contrary to another ``murder without body'' case in March where the Supreme Court overturned a high court's ruling that acknowledged the killing. In a March ruling, the top court did not acknowledge the murder without a corpse, saying the evidence was insufficient to show the alleged offender's murder although he had the intention of killing the victim.