By Kim Hyun-bin
A woman, serving a life sentence for murdering her father, will get a retrial, according to the top court, Wednesday.
The Supreme Court decided, Friday, to grant a retrial for Kim Shin-hye, 41, who has been in prison for 18 years, after agreeing to her claim that she made a false confession due to coercive interrogation by police.
It is the first time the top court has decided to allow an inmate to stand retrial.
In March 2000, due to her father's continuous sexual abuse, Kim put sleeping pills in his alcoholic beverage and once he fell asleep, she killed him and abandoned the body at a bus stop in Wando, South Jeolla Province.
Kim was arrested after her uncle told the police “Kim Shin-hye killed her father.”
Police considered the continuous sexual molestation by her father to be the motive for the crime.
Kim confessed to the police of the crime, but later in the trial she claimed “I think my younger brother killed my father” and added that she falsely confessed to the crime to be imprisoned instead of her younger sibling. However, Kim had no evidence nor alibi to back up her claim.
On the other hand, the prosecution showed evidence of Kim registering her father with eight different life insurance policies and found a note at the suspect's house that had detailed plans of the crime.
She has been sentenced to life in prison in March 2001 and has been in prison for 18 years.
In January 2015, she submitted a request for a retrial to the Gwangju District Court. The court approved the request later that year in November after the evidence of coercion came out during a police investigation.
The prosecutors requested the appeal be rejected but the request was dismissed by the court in February. The prosecution made the same request to the Supreme Court, but again the request was dismissed.
The first trial will be held at the Gwangju District Court.