"I Have the Right to Kill for Pure White"... Life Sentence for Random Hiker Murderer

[Asia Economy Reporter Baek Kyunghwan] "I am pure white (白), so I have the right to judge and kill people. Everyone in the world mocks me and provokes me, making me angry, so I must remind people that they can die from a single act of arrogance or rudeness."

A man in his 20s, who was charged with stabbing and killing a stranger with a weapon, was ultimately sentenced to life imprisonment. After both the first and second trial courts sentenced him to life imprisonment, the prosecution, which had sought the death penalty, appealed, claiming "the sentence is too light," but the Supreme Court upheld the original judgment.

Recently, the Supreme Court confirmed the life imprisonment sentence in the appeal trial of Lee, who brutally murdered Han Mo (56), a female hiker who was sleeping in her car in Inje, Gangwon Province last year.

Han had come to the area with two companions to hike but, feeling unwell, did not climb the mountain and instead rested in her parked car at the trailhead, where she was attacked. Investigations revealed that Lee initially planned a 'serial murder' but, realizing it was impossible to avoid detection due to CCTV and other surveillance, he planned a 'continuous murder' involving killing multiple people in a short period.

Notably, Lee had harbored the desire to kill people continuously since elementary school and had concretely devised methods and tools for murder, recording his murderous intentions and plans in writing and drawings.

He also watched murder-related videos on the internet to plan his killings and to satisfy his murderous urges. In Lee's diary, entries such as "Most people are rude. Humans can never be reformed. No one should be alive. I hate you all and have always wanted to kill people. I have the right to judge and kill everyone. I will kill indiscriminately, but at least 100 to 200 people must die" were found.

Accordingly, the first trial court pointed out Lee's extreme disregard for human life, sentenced him to life imprisonment, and ordered him to wear an electronic tracking device for 20 years. The second trial court upheld the first trial's sentence, stating, "He killed the victims to satisfy a long-standing, objectively incomprehensible murderous desire and to derive pleasure, making the nature of the crime very serious."

Lee's claim of mental illness was rejected, as it was found that "since late elementary school, he thought killing people was easier than anything else in the world and wanted to make it his profession, continuously nurturing his murderous desires into adulthood, and psychiatric evaluations showed no mental disorder."

The Supreme Court's judgment was no different. The court stated, "Considering various sentencing factors such as the defendant's age, behavior, environment, and relationship with the victims, even when taking into account the circumstances argued in the appeal, it cannot be said that the first trial court's decision to sentence the defendant to life imprisonment was unjust."