ShareSEOUL: It reads like a K-drama plot: an ex-spy kidnaps a woman from an upscale district of Seoul over a crypto dispute, then kills her with drugs from a plastic surgery clinic. The case of purported spy-turned-hitman Lee Kyung-woo, who was sentenced to life in prison in October, has shocked South Korea, a safe and almost drug-free country where violent killings are rare.
The country has, however, had issues with crypto crime. It was home to fallen crypto king Do Kwon, currently in a Montenegrin jail awaiting extradition over the spectacular multi-billion-dollar collapse of his Terra and Luna tokens. At the centre of the gruesome homicide case is another collapsed cryptocurrency called PURE, based in the Seychelles but run by a Korean who was arrested last month on fraud and market manipulation charges.
A couple who had lost at least a billion won (around $760,000) in PURE hired hitman Lee—who claimed to be a former undercover agent for missions in North Korea—to kill the woman who had encouraged them to invest in the currency, and steal her digital assets.
For 70 million won, Lee masterminded the woman’s kidnapping and murder. On March 29 this year, the victim was abducted from a street in the Seoul district of Gangnam, drugged, coerced into handing over her crypto passwords, and then killed, with her body buried in the countryside 140 kilometres (85 miles) from the capital. The ketamine used to sedate and then kill the 48-year-old woman came from Lee’s wife, a nurse at a plastic surgery clinic, who gave it to him even though she was aware of his “intentions to commit a crime”, court documents obtained by AFP showed.
“It is difficult to estimate the fear and pain the victim must have felt when she was abruptly kidnapped by strangers in the middle of Seoul... and dragged to the hills near Daejeon to die,” judge Kim Seung-jeong of the Seoul Central District Court wrote in the ruling.
Spying claims
South Korea has long been regarded as one of Asia’s crypto hotspots, but spectacular, criminal implosions like that of Do Kwon’s tokens have shaken retail confidence and drawn official scrutiny to the sector.
Local officials have expressed concern over rising criminality linked to the industry, even this year creating a new inter-agency investigative unit to fight crypto crime. Hitman Lee lost his health club business during the pandemic and poured his life savings into PURE—which lost 95 percent of its value in early 2021.
Court documents said that Lee felt he had to use “any means necessary” to make money. Lee told clients he was a former military agent for missions in North Korea, court documents showed. Citing a court hearing, local media have suggested his claim was true. Lee also claimed he could “resolve matters” for the couple “by engaging in illegal methods” and discussed potential plans for the murder that included hiring a Chinese hitman and stealing the victim’s organs.—AFP
