Life sentence given to man who killed his ex-girlfriend, taxi driver

The 31-year-old Lee Ki-young, charged with murder and body dump, is being transferred to prosecutors in January. [NEWS1]

A man who killed a taxi driver and his ex-girlfriend received a life sentence.

The Goyang Branch of the Uijeongbu District Court on Friday morning sentenced Lee Ki-young, 32, to life in prison for murder and body dump.

Lee had elaborately planned the murder and used the victims' money to his benefit without showing any sign of remorse, the court said in its ruling.

Prosecutors have sought a death penalty for Lee during the final hearing of his trial on April 12.

Lee's crimes sparked public uproar when his murder first came to light.

Lee last August murdered his 50-year-old ex-girlfriend and landlady after hitting her in the head ten times with a blunt instrument to use her credit card.

He then dumped her body at a nearby riverside the next day.

He also murdered a taxi driver in December. Lee had hidden the body in a closet.

While the body of the taxi driver was found, the corpse of his ex-girlfriend, which Lee claimed had been buried along a river in Paju, remains missing.

The court also has ordered Lee to wear a GPS-tracking device for 30 years after he serves his time in prison.

However, the court said it took into account that Lee had pleaded guilty to all of the charges and deposited 30 million won ($22,500) for the victim's family and therefore didn't give a death sentence.

"It is difficult to conclude that there is an objective reason to sentence death that deprives the defendant's life itself due to low expectations on the penalty serving its purposes or expect remorse just with a life sentence," Judge Choi Jong-won, who presided over the trial, said.

Lee was caught for murder when his girlfriend found the body of a taxi driver in a closet in his apartment while trying to find cat food in December last year. The taxi driver had been missing for six days.

Lee lured the taxi driver into his apartment after hitting the driver's taxi while driving under the influence, promising to compensate the driver for damages in cash, investigators involved in the case said.

After murdering the taxi driver, he pretended to be the driver and contacted the victim's family through a mobile messenger.

Lee used the driver's credit card until his new girlfriend found the victim's body, spending roughly 54 million, including 45 million on loans.

The taxi driver's vehicle was later found 1 kilometer away from Lee's apartment.

Lee's murder of his ex-girlfriend was also later revealed during the investigation, as the apartment he was living in was under his ex-girlfriend.

Law enforcement suspected Lee's ex-girlfriend was murdered in August last year when the victim's proof of life ended.

Police found a contract between Lee and his ex-girlfriend, whom he says he murdered, that shows Lee borrowed 300 million won from the missing woman.

Lee confessed to the murder of the woman.

However, despite searching for the body with Lee present on the scene, the woman's body remains missing.

Lee has been caught four times for DUI — in May and September of 2013, once in December 2018 and again in November 2019.

In September 2013, while serving in the military, he drove 2 kilometers (1.24 miles) with a police officer hanging onto the vehicle. He was incarcerated at a military prison for 18 months in 2013 for obstruction of justice and driving without a license.

In 2019, he was sentenced to a year in prison after again being caught for DUI while on a two-year probation after receiving a delayed sentence of 8 months for the same charge in 2018.

BY LEE HO-JEONG, SOHN DONG-JOO [sohn.dongjoo@joongang.co.kr]