10-6-2024 (SEOUL) In a development that has sent shockwaves through both nations, South Korean prosecutors have indicted one of three suspects in the gruesome murder of a fellow Korean national, whose body was found encased in a concrete-filled barrel in a reservoir near the Thai resort town of Pattaya.
The Changwon District Prosecutors’ Office, on Friday, formally charged the suspect, a man in his 20s, with the heinous crimes of murder and abandoning a body overseas, according to reports from the Yonhap news agency. While withholding the names of the accused and the victim, South Korean authorities have cooperated closely with their Thai counterparts in unravelling the chilling details of this transnational case.
The suspect, previously identified by Thai police as Lee Roun, was apprehended in Jeongeup city, approximately 210 kilometres south of Seoul, last month after fleeing from Thailand in the aftermath of the gruesome incident. Alongside two alleged accomplices, he stands accused of murdering a 34-year-old South Korean man, known as Roh Eui-jong, in Thailand.
The victim’s body, according to Thai authorities, was callously placed in a barrel, which was then filled with concrete before being discarded in the Map Prachan reservoir in Bang Lamung district, on the outskirts of the popular tourist destination of Pattaya, in May.
One of the alleged accomplices, Lee Young Jin, aged 27, was apprehended while in hiding in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and has since been extradited to Thailand. Yonhap reports that South Korean police are currently in discussions with their Thai counterparts to facilitate his extradition to Seoul, where he would face charges related to the case.
The third alleged murderer, Kim Hyeonng Won, remains at large, with Thai police suspecting that he may have crossed the border into neighbouring Myanmar in an attempt to evade justice.
Shedding light on the suspected motive behind the heinous crime, a South Korean prosecutor grimly stated, “In search of money and valuables, the suspects approached, murdered him the victim and abandoned his body in a foreign country beyond South Korea’s jurisdiction.”
