Suspects Lee Eun-hae (31, left) and Jo Hyun-soo (30) in the 'Valley Murder Case' are entering the Incheon District Court on the afternoon of the 19th to undergo a pre-arrest detention hearing (warrant review). [Photo by Yonhap News]
[Asia Economy Reporter Park Hyesook] The suspects in the 'Gapyeong Valley Murder Case,' Lee Eunhae (31) and Jo Hyunsoo (30), have been detained by the prosecution. This comes nearly 2 years and 10 months after the incident occurred.
The Criminal Division 2 of Incheon District Prosecutors' Office (Chief Prosecutor Kim Changsoo) detained Lee and Jo on the 19th on charges of murder, attempted murder, and violation of the Special Act on the Prevention of Insurance Fraud.
On the same day, Chief Judge Sobyeongjin of Incheon District Court, who is in charge of warrants, conducted a pre-detention suspect interrogation (warrant substantive examination) for 1 hour and 10 minutes starting at 3:30 p.m., and then issued detention warrants citing "risk of flight."
The investigating prosecutor who appeared at the warrant hearing reportedly argued that "since the suspects fled for a long period before being arrested, there is a necessity for detention."
At the court where the warrant hearing was held, the sister of Lee's husband A (39 years old at the time of death) also attended and lamented, "After losing my younger brother first, the whole family is living in extreme misery," adding, "We only later learned about Lee's insurance fraud and attempted murder, and are struggling with the situation."
Lee is accused of killing her husband A (39 years old at the time of death) on June 30, 2019, at Yongsogyeok Valley in Gapyeong-gun, together with her lover Jo.
The prosecution believes that Lee and others forced A, who could not swim at all, to dive into the valley without any equipment and ignored his calls for rescue, leading to his death.
The prosecution applied the charge of so-called 'murder by omission,' asserting that the suspects deliberately did not rescue A despite being able to do so, aiming to claim the 800 million KRW life insurance money taken out in A's name.
Earlier, they were also charged with attempting to kill A by feeding him food mixed with pufferfish poison and other substances or by drowning him in a fishing pond in February and May of the same year.
Lee and others fled before their second prosecution investigation on December 14 last year but were caught by the police on the 16th near Samsong Station in Goyang-si, Gyeonggi Province, in an officetel after being on the run for four months.
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