On the morning of the 12th, at the funeral hall of Kyungpook National University Hospital in Jung-gu, Daegu, the bereaved families and fellow lawyers of the victims of the arson are leaving the procession. News 1
The lawyer of the Daegu Law Building arsonist who took the lives of 7 people spoke up. A lawyer in charge of the suspect, Chun (53), said in a phone call with the Hankook Ilbo on the 12th, “Mr. He thought for a long time when he asked if his life was threatened, and then he declined to say, “I will not answer.”
Lawyer A has been in charge of litigation related to Mr. Chun’s redevelopment case. He said, “Chun’s attitude toward the trial was poor, so he was stopped a lot by the court, and he said a lot of harsh words to me as he would to the other party’s lawyer.” He seemed to find it difficult to quickly answer questions related to Mr. Chun, and half of it was consistent with ‘no comments’.
Lawyer A is the last person Chun met before committing a crime in the Law Building. At 10 am on the 9th, the same day of the incident, I saw Chun for the last time at the appeal trial for the collection claim, which was held at the Civil Division 2 of the Daegu High Court.
In general, it is customary for a lawyer not to appear in a sentencing hearing, as only the judge gives a sentence. However, on that day, Mr. Chun said that he was invited to attend. The court ruled, “It is difficult to conclude that the company has a debt to pay to Chun based on the evidence submitted by Chun.”
Lawyer A remembered the last appearance, saying, “After the sentencing today, we broke up around 10:10-20 am, but even after losing Chun, he didn’t seem more excited than usual.” It is presumed that Mr. Chun decided to commit the crime before the verdict, as it was postponed that he went straight home and set fire to the legal building around 10:55 with gasoline and weapons, which he had prepared in advance.
A police official said, “Most of the time, right before the criminal commits a planned crime, he doesn’t show the outside.” On the 8th, Chun was also sentenced to a fine of 2 million won for posting false information on the Internet about the representative of the redevelopment project operator (defamation, violation of the Personal Information Protection Act, etc.).
Lawyer A said that there were cases where Mr. Chun stopped him because he made excessive claims in the lawsuit. He said, “Most clients are like that, and Mr. Chun was the same.” He continued, “After the incident, I keep thinking about Chun, but I don’t think it’s appropriate to talk about how I feel about him.”
Daegu = Junho Jeon reporter jhjun@hankookilbo.com
