South Korean prosecutors on Wednesday asked an appellate court to uphold the death sentence given to former intelligence chief Kim Jae-kyu for the 1979 assassination of President Park Chung-hee, at the final hearing of a retrial sought by Kim’s family.
The Seoul High Court’s seventh criminal division, presided over by Judge Gu Hoi-geun, said it would deliver its ruling on Dec. 16 at 2 p.m., closing a retrial that began 45 years after Kim was executed.
Kim was indicted on charges including murder with the purpose of insurrection and attempted insurrection for shooting Park and presidential security chief Cha Ji-cheol at a safe house in Seoul’s Gungjeong-dong district on Oct. 26, 1979. Courts of first and second instance both sentenced him to death, and the Supreme Court rejected his appeal on May 20, 1980, confirming the sentence. He was executed four days later.
His family petitioned for a retrial in May 2020, saying the case required historical re-evaluation. They argued the trial had not been conducted fairly because of illegal intervention by the new military leadership that seized power after Park’s death, that testimony had emerged of torture during the investigation, and that trial transcripts differed considerably from audio recordings of the hearings.
The Seoul High Court’s retrial panel held three examination sessions between April and July 2024 and ordered a retrial in May last year. The court found that investigators attached to the Martial Law Command had beaten and tortured Kim, including with electric shocks, over several days, and said the case met the grounds for retrial under the Criminal Procedure Act because the officers’ crimes had been proven but could no longer be prosecuted as the statute of limitations had expired.
At Wednesday’s closing hearing, prosecutors said the fact that then-President Park and security chief Cha died from Kim’s gunfire was clearly established.
This cannot be evaluated simply as the killing of natural persons.
Prosecutors said Kim had killed the president, a state institution, rendering the exercise of his authority impossible, and that the act should be judged an organized riot by a group given Kim’s position and his close ties with subordinates. They said the original judgment could not easily be reversed given the confrontation with North Korea at the time, the sudden death of the military’s commander-in-chief and the possibility of armed clashes between government agencies.
On the procedural violations alleged by the defense, prosecutors said flaws in trial records and recording conditions arose from the physical and practical limits of the time and could not fairly be ruled illegal.
Kim’s lawyers argued the case did not meet the requirements for insurrection, lacking the purpose of subverting the constitutional order or the assembly of a multitude. “The Supreme Court has also held that without a mass combination there can be no insurrection,” a defense lawyer said, adding it was clear the act had not disturbed the peace of an entire region.
Kim’s third-youngest sister, identified only by her surname, addressed the court. “The 10.26 trial is a shameful chapter in the history of South Korea’s judiciary,” she said. “What the family seeks is history more than a verdict.” She asked the bench to act “so that I can face my brother without shame when I meet him in heaven.”
The Seoul High Court is scheduled to hand down its decision on Dec. 16.