A woman in her 20s whom she met through a tutoring app murdered and mutilated her body, raising the possibility that Yoo Jung-jeong (23) may have committed the murder with the intention of stealing the identity of her victim, who was a student at a prestigious university.
According to police on Feb. 2, Jung had been living as a “reclusive loner” for five years without a job since graduating from high school in 2018. She lived alone with her grandfather in an apartment in Busan, and her grandfather reportedly provided for her.
Jung was said to be a closed person and had no social connections. She rarely left the house and reportedly enjoyed reading crime novels and online content at home. Neighbors said they found it hard to believe that the normally quiet and reserved Jung had committed the crimes.
Recently, Jung had been preparing for a civil service exam. Her grandfather told MBC on January 1, “(My granddaughter) had a civil service written exam next month. She was studying in the reading room, library, and other places, but something unimaginable happened,” he said. “This happened because I raised my granddaughter incorrectly. I want to apologize to the bereaved family a hundred times, that’s how I feel,” he added.
Jung Yoo-jeong’s grandfather told reporters at her home that he wanted to apologize to the bereaved family, saying, “Something unimaginable happened.” Screen capture from MBC report
Experts have noted that Jung used a tutoring app staffed by highly educated university students to find a target, and specifically targeted a victim who was popular online and had a high level of education.
“It is suspected that the crime was committed to steal the victim’s identity,” Lee Soo-jeong, a professor of criminal psychology at Kyungpook National University, told MBC. “(The victim) was a popular tutor online, and (Jung) was trying to steal this woman’s identity as a way to overcome her handicap,” Lee explained.
The police plan to use a profiler to conduct psychological counseling on Jung and investigate whether she has antisocial personality disorder or psychopathy.
Jung approached the woman on a tutoring app, pretending to be a parent of a third-grade student. Once she had identified her target, she bought a second-hand school uniform and went to visit her. The victim, who was home alone at the time, was apparently attacked while she was defenseless.
After killing a female classmate, Jeong returned home, grabbed a body bag, and headed back to the crime scene. Screen capture from MBC report
Jung Yoo-jeong was detained for killing the victim with a weapon at her home in Geumjeong-gu, Busan, at around 5:40 p.m. on March 26 and then abandoning her body. After mutilating the victim’s body, she put it in a suitcase and took a taxi to a forest near the Nakdong River in Yangsan, Gyeongnam. A’s crime was discovered by the police, who responded to a report from a taxi driver who found it strange that a suitcase with blood stains was dumped in the woods.
Forensic results confirmed that Jung had been intensively searching for “murder” online since February of this year, three months before the crime, while preparing for a job메이저사이트. In particular, it was found that she had developed an interest in murder by watching many crime investigation programs through broadcast media and the Internet. Before the crime, she searched for “murder,” “murder without a body,” and “murder case,” and also borrowed crime novels from the local library.
A police official said, “Jung said, ‘I’m sorry for the dead victims and their families,'” adding, “We plan to send the case to the prosecutor’s office as soon as we finalize the investigation.”