Itaewon Burger King Murder Case Re-Trial Set To Begin
Does everyone remember the Itaewon Burger King murder case? Well it is back for round two of two decade long effort to convict the then dependent of USFK contractor of murdering a Hongik University student back in 1997:
The two original suspects in a high-profile 1997 Itaewon murder case could potentially be brought back together today in a preparatory session before the start of legal proceedings in the trial against 36-year-old American Arthur Patterson.
Patterson and his friend, Edward Lee, were accused of killing Hongik University student Cho Jung-pil at a fast food restaurant on April 3, 1997, in Itaewon, a popular foreigner-friendly district in central Seoul.
Cho was found dead in the bathroom of a Burger King, stabbed nine times in his neck and chest. The two men, then 18, were both in the restaurant at the time of the murder and both pinpointed the other in the killing.
Lee, a Korean-American, was later convicted for the murder but was acquitted of those charges in 1998 by the Supreme Court, which ruled that there was insufficient evidence to conclude that the murder had been carried out by one man.
He will attend as a witness in the trial against Patterson, who was originally charged and convicted for weapons possession and destruction of evidence before fleeing to the United States in 1999.
“We have confirmed that Lee … is currently staying in Korea,” a prosecutor from the Seoul Central Prosecutors’ Office said on Wednesday, adding that it was planning to request Lee as a witness in the preparatory session to be held at the Seoul Central District Court.
The same day, Lee’s father appeared on a radio program to reiterate that his son would testify in the case.
“My son came to Korea about a month ago and he will attend [the preparatory session] as a witness,” he said. “We want the case closed this time so that we can finally be free from it.” [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read the rest at the link and you can read more about this case at this prior posting. Basically this whole case comes down to incompetence in the Korean judicial system to let these two go free in the first place. This was a brutal murder that the family deserves justice for.
