South Korean man cleared of killing teenager after spending 20 years in jail for her murder

By Julia Hollingsworth, Yoonjung Seo and Jake Kwon, CNN


 Thu December 17, 2020



The high school graduation photo of Lee Chun-jae, left, and a facial composite of the Hwaseong serial killer / Korea Times

Seoul, South Korea (CNN)A man who wrongfully spent 20 years in prison for killing a teenager has been cleared of her murder following a high-profile court case in South Korea that exposed police torture and investigation failures.
Yoon Seong-yeo -- now in his 50s -- was found not guilty Thursday following a retrial in the northwestern city of Suwon over the 1988 rape and murder of a 13-year-old in her bedroom in Hwaseong, then a rural, undeveloped area near the country's capital Seoul.
The teenager was one of 10 killed in the area between 1986 and 1991 in a spate of high-profile deaths known as the Hwaseong murders. Yoon was the only person ever convicted in connection to the killings. He was sentenced to life in prison and ultimately spent 20 years behind bars for the 13-year-old's rape and murder.

He spent 20 years in prison for murder. Then someone else confessed to the same crime

In a verdict released Thursday, judge Park Jeong-je found that police had used torture, including sleep deprivation, and illegal detainment to obtain Yoon's confession to the 1988 murder.

"As a member of the judiciary, I apologize to the accused, who suffered great physical and mental pain, for the court's failure to function properly as the last bastion of human rights," he said. We sincerely hope that the retrial of this case will be a little consoling and contribute to the restoration of the accused's honor."

The result means Yoon's name is finally cleared -- more than 30 years after the murder took place. It's also a rare outcome in South Korea, where only a tiny fraction of applications for retrials are accepted, according to experts.

"I'm relieved that the final ruling found me innocent," Yoon said following the verdict. "I can let down this heavy load I've been carrying for 30 years and get some rest."

Yoon has claimed his innocence for years, but was only granted a retrial after police made a breakthrough in the case last year.

In September, police announced that new DNA evidence linked at least some of the Hwaseong murders to Lee Chun-jae, who has been in prison since 1994 for the rape and murder of his sister-in-law. The following month, Lee confessed to all 10 of the murders and another four that police did not provide details on.

Coerced confession

At the months-long retrial, Yoon's lawyers argued that their client -- who was a 22-year-old, uneducated repairman with a limp from childhood polio when he was arrested -- was coerced by police into confessing.

Yoon told CNN that he was handcuffed in a room for three days, was not allowed to sleep, and barely ate during the interrogation.

30 years ago, he was wrongfully convicted of murder. Now police have apologized for forcing him to make a false confession

In July, Gyeonggi Nambu Provicial Police Agency chief Bae Yong-ju admitted that during the initial investigation in 1989, police assaulted Yoon and coerced him into making a false confession.

"We bow down and apologize to all victims of the crimes of Lee Chun-jae, families of victims, and victims of police investigations, including Yoon," Bae said, noting others had suffered from "police malpractice" during the initial Hwaseong investigation.

According to Lee Soo-jung, a forensic psychology professor at Kyonggi University, it was common in the 1980s for suspected criminals in South Korea to be kept awake for long periods to extract a confession. Sleep deprivation is considered a form of torture.

In an interview with CNN in November, Korean National Police Agency commissioner general Kim Chang-yong said last year's police investigation revealed that police had used illegal confinement and incorrect investigation techniques. He said the decision to reveal past wrongdoing showed police commitment to not making the same mistakes.

"It was a shameful, illegal investigation," he said. "I believe that it should never happen again and that's why we need checks and balances. Police are working hard not to repeat past mistakes."

Cold case solved

For decades, the Hwaseong murders -- which were revisited in "Memories of Murder," a 2003 film by "Parasite" director Bong Joon Ho -- remained unsolved. Lee's confession may have helped bring some closure to the families of the victims.

Kim said police profilers interviewed Lee 52 times over nearly seven months before he admitted to all the crimes he had committed. "He did not confess easily," Kim said.

On one remarkable session in November during the months-long retrial, Lee took the stand to confess to the killings in front of Yoon. He said he didn't know why he hadn't been a suspect during the initial investigation, and said he had even been questioned by police at the time of the killings when he had a watch belonging to one of the victims on his person.

"I didn't think the crimes would be buried forever," Lee said. "I came and testified and described the crimes in hopes for (the victims and their families) to find some comfort when the truth is revealed. I'll live my life with repent."

What happens next

Yoon can now seek compensation for the 20 years he spent wrongfully imprisoned. One of Yoon's lawyers, Park Joon-young, told CNN earlier this year that Yoon could probably expect more than $1 million in compensation.

Yoon has previously told CNN that no amount of money can compensate him for the years he spent in prison and the impact on his reputation and family.

Police are planning to issue a white paper on the Hwaseong case and police failures during the initial investigation. Kim said it is "impossible" to imagine such failings happening now.
There is unlikely to be justice for the families of the Hwaseong victims.

Even though Lee has confessed to the murders, he cannot be prosecuted for the Hwaseong cases as the statute of limitations on those killings has expired.

US man jailed for nearly four decades is freed after witness admits to lying
Omar Abdel-Baqui Dec 16 2020

JUNFU HAN/DETROIT FREE PRESS/TNS
Walter Forbes, 63, became a free man on November 20, after more than 37 years in prison.

US man Walter Forbes was a full-time student at Jackson Community College in 1982. He had dreams of owning a real estate development firm after graduating.

One night that year, Forbes broke up a bar fight. He didn’t know that would change his life forever.

A man involved in the bar fight shot Forbes the next day, according to court documents.

The damage the gunshot did to Forbes’ body may have taken a few months to heal, but what happened next led to him spending nearly four decades in prison, leaving deep lifelong wounds on him and his family.

The man who shot Forbes, Dennis Hall, died in his apartment on Maple Street in Jackson in a fire that appeared to be deliberately set on July 12, 1982.

Because Hall and Forbes were recently involved in an altercation, police considered Forbes a suspect in the arson. Police arrested him at his home.

Forbes was convicted of arson and murder in May 1983 and was sentenced to life in prison.

Forbes, 63, became a free man on November 20, more than 37 years following his conviction, after the prosecution’s star witness admitted to fabricating her story and evidence surfaced that the fire may have been part of an insurance fraud scheme orchestrated by the Maple Street building owner, leading to a retrial, according to documents filed in Jackson County Circuit Court.

“It felt like all the possibilities that I was working on all those years were coming to fruition,” Forbes said about when truth was coming to light. “I didn’t think it would take that long, but patience paid off.”

Witness comes forward

Key evidence used to implicate Forbes was witness testimony from a woman, Annice Kennebrew, who said she saw three men, including Forbes, burn down the century-old, two-story house-turned-apartment on Maple Street.

Kennebrew’s testimony contained discrepancies, leading one of the three men to have charges against him dismissed after he passed a polygraph test and the other to be acquitted, according to court documents. Forbes was the only one convicted, likely because of the tension between him and the victim, his attorney said.

Forbes and his attorney said that the burden of proof was placed on Forbes, that the jury saw him as guilty until he could prove himself innocent from the minute the trial began.

“Merely being arrested and charged suggests to the jury that something happened even though they should be scrutinising the evidence and presuming innocence,” Forbes’ attorney, Imran Syed of the Michigan Innocence Clinic, told the Detroit Free Press. "No jury wants to believe that a prosecutor went through the trouble of bringing someone to trial if they’re truly innocent.”

Kennebrew admitted in 2017 that she had lied – that she never saw Forbes at the scene of the fire, according to court documents.

After a judge granted an evidentiary hearing in February 2020, Kennebrew testified “that she had falsely implicated Mr Forbes because she had been (intimidated) into doing so by two local men who knew her from around the neighborhood and who had threatened to harm her and her family if she did not implicate Mr Forbes,” according to court documents.

“Even though it took forever, I’m still grateful she did the right thing, that she did finally tell the truth,” Forbes said.

Kennebrew (whose last name was Gibson in 1982) did not return messages from the Detroit Free Press.

A witness who knowingly lied under oath could be charged with perjury, however, the statute of limitations for the crime is generally six years, Syed said. A perjury charge in this case can be dangerous and counterproductive, he added.

“We want people who lied to come forward,” he said. “The community as a whole is harmed if lies remain hidden forever.”

JUNFU HAN/DETROIT FREE PRESS/TNS
“It felt like all the possibilities that I was working on all those years were coming to fruition,” Walter Forbes said about when truth was coming to light. “I didn’t think it would take that long, but patience paid off.”

Fire for insurance funds

As for the alleged arson-for-insurance-money scheme, the Maple Street building’s owner, David Jones, was convicted in a separate arson conspiracy scheme in Livingston County in 1990.

A man died in the Livingston County fire as well, court documents say, and the two people who admitted to conspiring with Jones to burn the building down in 1990 told police that they were aware of Jones’ role in the 1982 Maple Street fire.

Jones received over US$50,000 (NZ$70,000) in insurance money for the Maple Street fire, far above market value for the building. He had bought the property more than eight years before the fire but only insured it two months before the fire, according to court documents that cited reports from the fire investigator on the case.

Jones died a few years before the Michigan Innocence Clinic took on Forbes’ case in 2010. He cannot be criminally charged posthumously.

“I don’t hold contempt for the people who lied to convict me,” Forbes said. “The reason is selfish: I wasn’t going to allow them to destroy me.

“If I didn’t forgive, it wouldn’t be detrimental to them, it would be detrimental to me.”

A new beginning

Forbes is a man of few words. He takes his time to process questions directed toward him and concisely responds in his low-pitched, soothing voice.

He recoiled when asked about his faith in the American justice system.

“Calling it the justice system gives a false impression. Just using the term ‘justice’ gives you the sense that it is a just system,” Forbes said.

Black people make up about 13 per cent of the US population but account for about half of all exonerations and 54 per cent of homicide exonerations since 1989, according to the National Registry of Exonerations.

Forbes spoke about his perspective as a young Black man in the 1980s, imprisoned against his will by a system that has “justice” in its name for something he didn’t do.

“I couldn’t believe it was happening. One of the things I had faith in was that the truth was going to come out, that there was no way they were going to convict me for those lies,” Forbes said. “Up until I was convicted, I thought the system would work, that it would correct itself. In hindsight, I was naive.”

Although cognizant of the system that oppressed him, Forbes’ manner isn’t one of someone who is spiteful, rather it’s of a man who worked to find inner peace.

Forbes spoke about a few things that helped him get through the over 13,000 days and nights in prison.

He would wake up in the middle of the night, at 2 or 3am, and meditate.

“I always knew what the end result was going to be, but I had no clue what I had to go through or who was going to be of help along the way,” Forbes said. “Surest thing I knew was I had to keep moving forward.”

It wasn’t until November he realised it was actually happening – that he was going to be a free man and that his name would be cleared.

Forbes spoke with his family often while in prison: sometimes weekly, sometimes several times a day. He knew that he would have a support system once released, and that gave him comfort, he said.

“Seeing my family for the first time, it was one of those moments where all you can do is grin,” Forbes said.

Forbes is currently staying with family in metro Detroit and plans on visiting his mum, 94, in Mississippi in the coming weeks. He had planned to see his mother right away but thought it would be best to do what he had done for the past four decades: patiently wait, in this case, for Covid-19 infection rates to decrease.

Forbes is now the patriarch of a family that had been missing one, his relatives said. His wisdom and insight is revered.

“He’s been able to bring a lot of our family together already – family I didn’t really know before,” Forbes’ nephew, Imil Forbes, 40, said. “We’re now getting together and creating a strong bond.

“We needed him out here for us to come together like that.”

Forbes’ biological son, Runako Forbes, 42, hadn’t gotten to know his father until he was 13.

Runako Forbes was adopted. He didn’t fully comprehend where Forbes was and why until meeting him as a teenager.

Runako Forbes recounted meeting his dad for the first time: “There were a lot of people in the visiting room. I remember looking over my shoulders, seeing him and knowing that he was my dad. I had never seen a picture of him before, but in my heart I just knew that was him. He finally came up to me and hugged me. I knew I was right.”

He said he loved his father before he had ever met him, and that once he understood the situation and knew that his father was innocent, he grew angry.

“I can’t pretend like there wasn’t a lot of bitterness I had toward the world,” he said. “But I try to go more off his demeanor. He’s more patient than me. He would never say ‘couldn’t’ or ‘can’t’.”
Liberated but not yet independent

Forbes’ first order of business as a free man is to become independent with the help of his family and adjust to a world much different than the one he knew before being locked up, he said.

Readjusting won’t be seamless, Forbes said. For instance, a piece of technology so essential to our daily lives hadn’t existed before his conviction.

Forbes laughed when talking about smartphones.

“I might spend half an hour figuring out what takes someone else 20 seconds,” he said. “I’ll be missing calls because the phone be acting up on me. I don’t know how to operate it yet.”

But he reflects on his time in prison, when he would hear people’s problems in the outside world and wished his problems were as trivial.

“The challenges of readjusting to life outside prison, I see it as part of the process,” Forbes said. “I recognise what I can control and can’t, and when I do see challenges, I don’t stress and I try to find a solution to them.”

Forbes is more focused on the luxuries absent in prison that he can now access.

“A lot of things you don’t realise you miss because they just faded away,” he said.

Once somewhat readjusted, Forbes wants to be an entrepreneur, collaborating with friends on their existing companies. He’s especially interested in construction.

Chiefly, he said, he wants to ease suffering in the world and spread good where he can.

“I am still trying to figure out the most effective way to help others,” Forbes said.

Forbes said upon his release, his thoughts were directed toward the prisoners of Kinross Correctional Facility, the last of about a dozen facilities he was imprisoned at and where as of December 4 there were over 1000 active positive coronavirus cases, according to Michigan Department of Corrections data.

Michigan in 2016 passed a law that allows wrongfully convicted people to receive US$50,000 for each year they were imprisoned. Having been convicted for over 37 years, Forbes is entitled to nearly US$2 million in compensation from the state, but the money won’t come for months, Syed, his attorney, said.

Forbes said the wrongfully convicted must keep a positive mindset and remain motivated to uncover the truth.

“Work harder on your case than anyone else,” he said. “You have to be the driving force behind your own liberation.”

- Detroit Free Press

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

INDIA
Police raid factory making counterfeit spices ‘out of donkey dung and acid’

Police find donkey dung, hay, inedible colours and drums full of acid in the factory during the raid

Stuti Mishra in Delhi@StuteeMishra

Indian factory creating fake spices with donkey dung busted
(AFP via Getty Images)

Police in India’s northern state of Uttar Pradesh say they have busted a factory producing fake spices using donkey dung, acid and other such spurious ingredients.

The factory based in Agra, the city famous for the Taj Mahal, was raided on Monday by officers who found large quantities of different types of counterfeit spices including red chilli powder, coriander powder, turmeric and garam masala (mixed spices) which were being readied to be sold under the names of several local brands, according to a report by the Times of India newspaper.

The city’s joint magistrate Prem Prakash Meena said in a statement that the authorities seized over 300kg of counterfeit spices and also found “donkey dung, hay, inedible colours and drums full of acid” that manufacturers were using to create the fake condiments.

The authorities say they have sent 27 samples to labs for testing. A case has been registered against the owner of the factory, Anoop Varshney, who is a member of Hindu Yuva Vahini, a right wing Hindu organisation founded by the chief minister of the state Yogi Adityanath.

According to Mr Meena, the owner also failed to provide a licence for operating the spice factory or the registration of brands under which the spices were being prepared to be sold.

The authorities are now investigating where these counterfeit spices or the ingredients were being supplied and sold and if it is going to cause any serious health hazards to those who may have consumed it.

Food adulteration in India is a common problem and several such factories producing counterfeit products have been busted by the police in the past. Last month a factory was raided in the southern city of Cuttack where adulterated spices like turmeric and chilli powder were being produced.

UPDATED

Fiji braces for flooding, huge waves as

Cat 5 Cyclone Yasa approaches

Fiji has issued a nationwide lockdown and declared a state of natural disaster as Cyclone Yasa barrels towards the island nation

.

Vessels are seen onshore ahead of Cyclone Yasa at Royal Suva Yacht Club in Suva, Fiji December 16, 2020, in this image obtained from social media. (Reuters)

Fiji declared a state of natural disaster, ordering its entire population to take shelter ahead of a nightly curfew as a potentially devastating cyclone approached the Pacific Island nation.

Cyclone Yasa, a top category five storm, is expected to bring winds of up to 250 km/h and torrential rain across the South Pacific archipelago when it makes landfall overnight.

Still a few hours out from the worst weather, Fiji's Meteorological Service said storm force winds and heavy rains have been recorded in some parts of the country already.

Images shared on social media showed roads blocked by landslides, floodwaters and fallen trees.

By 0800GMT, the centre of Yasa is forecast to be 100 km east of the village of Yasawa-i-Rara and potentially over Fiji's fifth-most populous province of Bua, home to 15,000 people, Fiji's National Disaster Management Office said.

Reinforcing the threat, Fiji Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama told the country's near 1 million population to find safe shelter ahead of a 14-hour nationwide curfew beginning 0400GMT.

"The impact for this super storm is more or less the entire country," Bainimarama said in a video posted to Facebook.

Metservice Fiji

@FJMETservice

Update on Severe Tropical Cyclone Yasa

12:45 AM · Dec 17, 2020

87

59 people are Tweeting about this

Yasa would "easily surpass" the strength of 2016's Cyclone Winston, he added, referring to the southern hemisphere's most intense tropical storm on record, which killed more than 40 Fijians and left tens of thousands of people homeless.

The curfew order was given as part of the state of natural disaster order, which will run for 30 days.

Over 95 percent of the population live in the direct path of Yasa, said Bainimarama, adding weather forecasts anticipated flash flooding and "severe coastal inundation" that included waves up to 10 metres high

Residents in the areas deemed most at risk said the warnings were been heeded.

"We'll see what happens," said Alumita Bati, a chef from the capital Suva who was forced to evacuate with her son and husband from their corrugated tin house in a low-lying settlement outside the country's most populous city.

Bati's family boarded up the windows of their house with more tin before going to her sister's house on higher ground where she felt safer but still "a bit scared".

Fiji banned the running of public transport, and was taking precautions with some 50 foreign yachts moored in the southern part of the island chain.

"The boats have been moved to mangrove shelter, which provide good protection against the winds," said Cynthia Rasch, chief executive officer of Port Denarau Marina.

Fiji in October opened to foreign boats in a bid to revive a tourism industry hit hard by the coronavirus. Dubbed the Blue Lane initiative, foreign yachts have to follow stringent requirements to enter Fiji, including a 14-day quarantine out at sea.

  

 

 

CYCLONE YASA: CATEGORY 5 CYCLONE HITS FIJI CAUSING LANDSLIDES, FLOODING, 345KMH GUSTS, AND 14-METRE SWELLS NZTV  Dec 17 2020                                                              

Brittney Deguara

Landslides, flooding, strong gusts and large swells are adding to the “destructive” Cyclone Yasa, which hit Fiji two hours earlier than predicted.

The category 5 cyclone made landfall in Bua, Vanua Levu, at 6pm Thursday (7pm NZ time), two hours earlier than originally predicted, according to Metservice Fiji. A state of natural disaster has been declared and a strict curfew imposed until Friday morning.

The eye of the storm is passing 100 kilometres east of Yasaway-i-rara and 90km southwest of Labasa, according to the Fijian Government.

Update on Severe Tropical Cyclone Yasa  pic.twitter.com/mTmhpICi54

— Metservice Fiji (@FJMETservice) December 17, 2020

Metservice Fiji is predicting the centre of the cyclone to be located about 25km northwest of Koro and 130km northeast of Suva by 11pm. By 11am on Friday, it will be about 80km east of Moala and 230km east of Suva.

READ MORE:
* Cyclone Yasa: Fiji prepares for damaging winds, flooding as category 5 storm heads for centre of island group
* One dead, dozens hurt and 2000 Fijian homes destroyed by Cyclone Harold
* Tonga declares state of emergency ahead of Tropical Cyclone Gita

New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa) is predicting “destructive impacts” for the islands, with damaging winds, flash flooding and dangerous seas expected with waves reaching heights of 14 metres or more.

Near the eye of the cyclone, wind speeds are forecast to average 240kmh with momentary gusts of up to 345kmh. The cyclone is moving southeast at about 18km an hour.

All major roads in the Ra Province’s Rakiraki are flooded. The region has been hit with rain and winds of more than 100kmh since 10am on Thursday, according to The Fiji Times.

Police are urging those in the region not to leave their houses.

SUPPLIED VIA THE FIJI TIMES

Bad weather from the approaching cyclone caused a landslide at Viwa on Thursday.

A landslide at Viwa has covered the road completely. Contractors are working to clear it, The Fiji Times reported.

Traffic lights in Nadi's CBD have been turned off to prevent the controller getting damaged.

More than 850,000 people, or more than 95 per cent of the country’s population, are reportedly in the direct path of the cyclone. A total of 1417 people have been evacuated to 53 evacuation centres across the country. Police are providing security at all the centres.

NIWA/SUPPLIED

Cyclone Yasa is making its way towards Fiji.

Cate Heinrich, who is in Suva, said power outages have already been experienced across the islands, and people have been told to stock up on food and drinking water to last the next few days.

“Everyone is inside and no-one’s moving anywhere now while we wait it out,” she told Stuff. “Everyone’s [as] prepared as they can be at this stage.”

FIJI POLICE FORCE/SUPPLIED

Heavy rain has caused flooding in parts of Fiji.

Fiji’s National Disaster Management Office (NDMO) is recommending people store enough water for up to seven days and boil it before drinking.

Heinrich, who is Unicef's Pacific chief of communication, said although she was not on the coast, she could feel the cyclone approaching. She described it as “very eerie”.

“It’s quite windy, the rain is coming down and ... you can feel that it’s coming, and it’s just going to get stronger. It’s getting closer and you can feel it.”

Heavy rain has already resulted in flooding in some areas. The Fiji Police Force issued a warning for people and children to stay clear of flooded areas.

“We have found a lot of children playing and left unsupervised in flooded areas, and please be reminded that we don’t want to arrest anyone due to disobedience of lawful order. However, if people continue to disregard our instructions, we will arrest them,” Fiji's assistant commissioner of police, Abdul Khan, said.

FIJI POLICE FORCE/SUPPLIED

Fiji Police are warning people to stay away from flooded areas as Cyclone Yasa nears.

Yasa is the fourth most powerful tropical cyclone recorded in the South Pacific region, according to Weather Watch, and is believed to be the strongest storm on Earth at the moment.

The level of damage could equal that caused by Cyclone Winston in 2016.

“Do not be caught off guard by this latest storm,” Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama said on Wednesday as the weather system moved towards Fiji.

The NDMO officially declared the situation a state of natural disaster on Friday. The declaration will remain for the next 30 days, with more regulations to follow.

“The declaration of Tropical Cyclone Yasa as a natural disaster under the Natural Disaster Management Act 1998 is now in force,” NDMO director Vasiti Soko said at a press conference, according to The Fiji Times.

“One of the key priorities in that is it allows the National Disaster Management Office to call all of government’s asset to be on standby and to be mobilised,” Soko said.

AILEEN TORRES-BENNETT/AP

A house is boarded up in preparation for Cyclone Yasa in the Tamavua neighborhood of Suva.

“There are provisions in the regulations where we will work with the Fiji Police Force in regards to evacuating people.”

A hurricane warning is in force for the Yasawa Group, the northern and eastern half of Viti Levu, Yadua, Galoa, Kia, Mali, Vanua Levu, Taveuni and nearby smaller islands, Matuku, Moala, Totoya and Lomaiviti Group.

The Fiji Meteorological Service has also issued warnings for storms, gales, storm surges, damaging heavy swells, heavy rain, severe flooding, and flash flooding.

A nationwide curfew has been in place since 4pm local time and will continue through to 6am Friday morning.

“Unless you are evacuating, that means stay off the roads and stay safely sheltered,” Bainimarama said in a post on Facebook on Thursday.

Bainimarama visited an evacuation centre in Newtown on Thursday to meet those who had been displaced.

Unicef is working with the Fijian Government to ensure the hardest hit regions will receive appropriate resources and care on Friday.

AILEEN TORRES-BENNETT/AP

A fast-food store is closed in the preparation for cyclone Yasa in the Samabula neighborhood of Suva.

Items such as tents, water and sanitation and health kits are prepared and ready to be distributed, with additional resources ready to be sent from Brisbane, Australia, if required.

“[We’re] hoping that the impact isn’t that huge, but we’re getting prepared,” Heinrich said.