Top court confirms life sentence on 'molar father'

Lee Young-hak, a murder suspect, enters the Seoul High Court in this September photo. The Supreme Court upheld the high court ruling that gave him a life sentence, Thursday, for sexually abusing and killing his daughter's friend./ Yonhap

By Jung Hae-myoung

The Supreme Court upheld the High Court's decision, Thursday, imposing a life sentence on Lee Young-hak, 36, for sexually abusing and murdering his daughter's friend and abandoning her body in the mountains in Gangwon Province.

The court dismissed Lee's appeal saying life imprisonment was the appropriate sentence considering his age, cognitive state, environment, relationship with the victim and his behavior after the crime.

A local court initially handed down the death penalty for his “inhumane and horrible crime,” saying "In the name of law and justice we give him the death penalty, separating him from society forever."

However, a high court commuted the penalty to a life sentence, saying “the murder was accidental and he was mentally unstable before the crime, so it can't be concluded that he is likely to repeat such an offense.”

Lee was indicted in September 2017 for luring his daughter's friend to his house, sexually assaulting the girl after giving her sleeping pills, killing her and abandoning her body.

He was also known as “molar father” because he had lost all his teeth except one molar, while being treated for the rare disease gignatiform cemetoma.

His 15-year-old daughter, who was indicted for abetting her father's crime, was sentenced to six years in prison. According to juvenile criminal law, her sentence can be reduced to four years for good behavior.