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| ▲ A photo, provided by Yonhap News TV, of the Supreme Court judges (Yonhap) |
Thailand murder-Supreme Court
Supreme Court confirms 17-yr sentence for man for beating programmer to death in Thailand
SEOUL, Nov. 9 (Yonhap) -- The Supreme Court on Thursday confirmed a 17-year prison sentence for a man charged with murdering and abandoning the body of a South Korean programmer working for his illegal gambling website in Thailand.
The 39-year-old, only identified by his surname Kim, was accused of beating the victim, who he had hired as a program developer for his gambling website, to death near a resort in Pattaya, Thailand, and leaving his body in a car at a parking lot in 2015.
Kim and a 40-year-old accomplice, surnamed Yoon, had habitually beat the victim, then 24, for not doing a good job. Fed up with the beating, the victim had attempted to flee but was caught at an airport, locked up and beaten again.
After learning the victim recorded the sound of the assault and uploaded it online, Kim was infuriated and killed him.
Soon after the crime, Kim fled to Vietnam but was repatriated to South Korea in April 2018 thanks to the help of Interpol's red notice and cooperation from local police.
The top court on Thursday upheld the prison sentence of 17 years for Kim and maintained the order to have the defendant wear an electronic tracking device for 10 years.
The court ruling came after the defendant was sentenced to 4 1/2 years by the top court on separate charges of jointly confining and causing bodily harm to the victim in 2019.
The accomplice in the case was sentenced to 14 years behind bars by an appeals court in September, pending a final decision by the Supreme Court.
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