Stepfather Sentenced to Life Imprisonment for Murdering and Abandoning Stepson to Claim Hundred-Million-Won Insurance Payout

[Asia Economy Reporter Baek Kyunghwan] A man in his 50s who killed his stepson to claim an insurance payout worth hundreds of millions of won and then hid the body has been sentenced to life imprisonment.

On the 3rd, the Supreme Court's 3rd Division confirmed the life sentence handed down by the lower court in the appeal trial of Mr. A, who was charged with murder and corpse abandonment.

Mr. A was prosecuted for beating his stepson B (20 years old at the time of death), who had an intellectual disability, to death with a blunt object in Imsil-gun, Jeonbuk Province, in September last year, and then abandoning the body. The prosecution judged the crime as motivated by the insurance money, considering that B had a life insurance policy with a payout amounting to 400 million won since July 2018.

Mr. A denied all charges during the trial. However, the first trial court sentenced him to life imprisonment. The court stated, "It can be confirmed that Mr. A entered Imsil from Namwon and returned near the scene of the incident," and added, "The fact that he visited the scene twice supports the indirect evidence that Mr. A committed the murder and abandoned the body."

Furthermore, the court explained, "In the CCTV footage of Mr. A's vehicle, a man can be seen sitting with his body leaning almost 90 degrees toward the driver's seat and his head bowed deeply," and "It is reasonable to assume that Mr. B was unconscious due to drugs or other substances."

Mr. A appealed, but the second trial court also rejected it, and the Supreme Court dismissed Mr. A's appeal.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.