A panel has decided to publicly disclose the identity of a suspect in his 40s who is accused of killing a former partner a year after she reported him for stalking, the Daejeon Metropolitan Police Agency said Monday.
The agency said it convened an identity-disclosure review committee, which voted to release the suspect's personal information. The chief of the Daejeon Jungbu Police Station then issued the final disclosure order in accordance with the committee's decision, Yonhap said.
Because the suspect, identified only as A, has objected to the disclosure, police plan to observe a mandatory waiting period of at least five days under the Act on Disclosure of Personal Information of Suspects of Specific Serious Crimes before releasing the information — as early as Nov. 9.
Earlier, police had decided not to convene the committee after the victim's family said Thursday they did not want the suspect's identity made public, citing concerns about secondary harm. The family later reversed that position, prompting the committee to be convened.
A is accused of killing a woman in her 40s, identified only as B, at her home in Jung-gu, Daejeon, on the afternoon of Oct. 24, then fleeing the scene. A was taken into custody Tuesday.
After the killing, A removed the SIM card from a mobile phone, took a taxi to Incheon International Airport and then fled to Gangneung in Gangwon Province, where A was arrested the following day at a local lodging facility.
A has told police the killing was impulsive, but investigators have deployed digital forensics specialists and a criminal profiler to determine whether the crime was premeditated and to establish the precise motive.
B had called the 112 emergency line to report A for stalking in October last year, but later indicated a desire not to pursue punishment, and the case was closed without referral to prosecutors in November of that year.
In December of the same year, another 112 call was made during an altercation between the two, but police closed the matter on the scene after finding no evidence of criminal conduct.
Police plan to refer the case to prosecutors on Tuesday, when A's detention period expires.
1 in 5 homicides preceded by relationship-based crimes
Meanwhile, recent data show that roughly one in five homicides in South Korea was preceded by so-called relationship-based crimes such as intimate partner violence or stalking.
According to data obtained from the Korean National Police Agency by Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Kim Nam-hee on Oct. 26, 543 of 2,760 homicide cases recorded from 2023 through September this year — or 19.7 percent — were found to have been preceded by prior offenses committed by the same perpetrator, including domestic violence, intimate partner violence, stalking and sexual violence.
Of 764 homicides in 2023, 147 cases, or 19.3 percent, were preceded by domestic violence, stalking, intimate partner violence or sexual assault.
The figure was 155 out of 769 cases (20.1 percent) in 2024, 140 out of 669 (20.9 percent) in 2025, and 101 out of 558 (18.2 percent) in the first nine months of this year.
"Current law does not adequately cover stalking behavior, which has meant victim protection has always been one step behind," Kim said. "I hope a practical safety system takes hold — one that prevents recurring tragedies and protects victims before they are exposed to violence."
yul@heraldcorp.com
