A man in his 20s set fire to the apartment basement recycling area... Police investigating

The Jungbu Police Station in Seoul announced on the 21st that they have arrested and are investigating a man in his 20s named Kim, who is suspected of setting fire to the underground recycling sorting area of an apartment building.

According to the police, Kim is suspected of arson (arson of a dwelling) for lighting a fire with a lighter on a pile of cardboard boxes in the recycling sorting area located on the second basement floor of an apartment in Ipjeong-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul, at around 1:36 a.m. that day.

The fire caused about 30 residents to evacuate in the middle of the night, and two people inhaled smoke in the hallway and were transported to the hospital. The fire did not spread outside the recycling sorting area. The fire department deployed 42 fire trucks and about 150 firefighters and completely extinguished the fire at around 4:12 a.m., approximately 2 hours and 30 minutes after the fire broke out.

Kim was caught at his home at around 3:48 a.m., about two hours after setting the fire, through police tracking of closed-circuit television (CCTV) footage.

Kim, who is reported to have an intellectual disability, was said to be rambling incoherently during the police investigation.

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