40 Years Ago Today, Serial Killer Kim Sun-ja Committed Her First Murder
On October 31, 1986, at a public bathhouse in Sindang-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul, a member of a gye-mo-im (women's savings club), identified as A (then 49), collapsed clutching her chest and died shortly after drinking a beverage handed to her by Kim Sun-ja (born 1939). The incident was later found to be the first murder committed by Kim, who eventually had a death sentence confirmed as a serial killer. Police were unable to secure evidence proving the first crime, and A's death was ruled a sudden cardiac arrest at the time.
In April 1987, B (then 50), another savings club member who had lent Kim 7 million won, collapsed and died on a city bus. Investigators found that B had been in Kim's company just before her death and had drunk a beverage Kim handed her. In February of the following year, C, a woman who had lent Kim 1.2 million won, vomited after drinking a beverage Kim gave her but survived her ordeal; Kim reportedly repaid the borrowed money.
The mysterious deaths soon extended to Kim's own family. On March 27, 1988, Kim's father collapsed and died on a bus while returning home from his 60th birthday celebration. About a month later, on April 29, Kim's younger sister, who owed her 10 million won, died in the same manner. Kim was found to have taken her sister's valuables after her death. On July 8 of that year, a female relative—her sister-in-law—who had borrowed money to secure housing, met Kim under the pretense of borrowing money for a home, drank a poisoned beverage at a coffeehouse, and was later found unconscious on a bus. The amount she had borrowed was determined to be 4.84 million won.
The breakthrough in the case came from the autopsy of the final victim. When potassium cyanide was detected in her body, police traced the victim's movements and financial relationships, discovering that all the deceased had been close to Kim and had been with her shortly before their deaths. On September 1 of that year, when police raided Kim's home, they found the victims' jewelry and checks, as well as cyanide wrapped in newspaper hidden in a gap in the bathroom wall. Police exhumed the already-buried victims' bodies for autopsies as they worked to prove the crimes.
Kim admitted to possessing the cyanide but denied the murder charges to the end, reportedly claiming she intended to use the poison to catch pheasants. At trial, she was acquitted of her father's death due to a lack of direct evidence, but was sentenced to death on the remaining charges, including robbery-murder. The sentence was upheld in both appeals courts and confirmed by the Supreme Court in 1989.
After about eight years behind bars, Kim was executed on December 30, 1997, along with 22 other death row inmates. No executions have been carried out in South Korea since the Ministry of Justice carried out these 23 executions on that day.
