'Uijeongbu Sewage Pipe Naked Corpse Case', No Signs of Homicide

Missing While Undergoing Tests in Emergency Room
Police Plan to Treat as Simple Death Case

The man found dead naked in a river sewage pipe in Uijeongbu, Gyeonggi Province, was revealed to have gone missing while undergoing examination in the emergency room.

The man had been suffering from dementia and other chronic illnesses under difficult circumstances, and it was understood that he lived in a monthly rental room with support from the factory where he worked. The police estimate that the reason he was found naked is because he exhibited the behavior known as "paradoxical undressing," where a person experiencing prolonged hypothermia removes their clothes despite the cold.

[Photo by YTN Capture]

According to Yonhap News on the 5th, the man in his 60s, Mr. A, who was found dead naked on the 16th of last month, was investigated to have worked at a furniture factory in Namyangju City. People around him said, "Mr. A only knew the way between his home and the factory," and "If he went somewhere else, he couldn't find his way home."

According to Yonhap News, on January 27th, Mr. A went to a factory in Yeoncheon County for work with Mr. B, a person related to the factory where he worked. At that time, Mr. A suddenly collapsed and had a seizure, and Mr. B hurriedly took him to the emergency room of a hospital in Uijeongbu City. After admitting Mr. A, Mr. B returned home.

However, after Mr. B left, Mr. A left the hospital on his own around 5 p.m. while undergoing examination. The police have identified this as Mr. A's last known whereabouts before he was found dead. It is also known that neither Mr. A's family nor Mr. B or others around him reported him missing after he disappeared from the hospital.

A police official stated, "The distance between the hospital and the sewage pipe is about 1 km," and added, "Considering the cold weather at the time, it is possible that Mr. A, who had dementia symptoms, wandered around and entered the sewage pipe."

Earlier, Mr. A's body was found around 2:40 p.m. on the 16th of last month in a river sewage pipe in Ganeung-dong, Uijeongbu, by a river construction worker. The fire department and police who responded to the report recovered the body about 8 meters inside the sewage pipe entrance. At the time of discovery, the body was naked with no special external injuries, and decomposition was underway.

The National Forensic Service, which performed an autopsy on Mr. A's body, verbally informed the police that "the cause of death is unknown, and there is no evidence to consider it a homicide." The police investigated the CCTV near the sewage pipe, which stored footage for one month, but found no abnormalities. After completing additional investigations with people around him, the police plan to close the case as a simple accidental death.