'Victim angered me with threats to report illegal hostess service'
A brutal murder suspect is being taken to the Gwacheon Police Station in Gyeonggi Province, Tuesday. Yonhap
The suspect in the mutilation and murder of a middle-aged man has said he killed the victim out of rage after the man threatened to report him to police over an illegal hostess service at his karaoke bar, police said Wednesday.
Police on Tuesday arrested a 34-year-old karaoke bar owner, identified only by his family name Byun, in Anyang, about 20 km south of Seoul, on charges of murder, body mutilation and others.
Byun is accused of stabbing a 51-year-old man to death in his karaoke bar and mutilating the body before disposing of it in a thicket near a parking lot of Seoul Grand Park on Aug. 10.
Police were chasing the suspect after the victim's dismembered body was found in a bush in the public park complex in Gwacheon, just south of Seoul, on Sunday. Byun has admitted to the charges.
Byun told police he killed the victim, who came to his karaoke bar as a customer, because he threatened to file a police report on him for running an illegal hostess business at the bar.
The customer apparently made the threat after he and Byun got into a scuffle about a hostess Byun had called in for the victim. He complained to Byun about the hostess' attitude and demanded he replace the hostess for him.
It is illegal to run a hostess business at a karaoke bar in Korea.
Byun told police he mutilated the body in his bar for fear that his crime would be revealed. He went out to buy a tool to dismember the body, police said.
Police plan to file for a court warrant to formally arrest him. Byun has no past criminal record. (Yonhap)