On the 8th, the Gyeongju branch of the Daegu District Prosecutors’ Office said it had indicted and detained the suspect, identified only as A, for abandoning her son in a garden plot beside a house and causing his death. Prosecutors say she gave birth to a boy on Jan. 9 and left him in the garden the following day in Oedong-eup.
Residents did not discover the abandoned infant until Feb. 21 — more than a month later — when someone found the baby and reported it, bringing the case to light.
The baby was found dead, wrapped in a burlap sack.
The suspect has confessed and told investigators she could not raise the child due to “various circumstances.”
Police initially applied a murder charge during the early stages of the investigation but later revised the accusation to child abuse resulting in death and transferred the case to prosecutors, citing the gravity of the offense.
Under South Korean criminal law, murder is punishable by death, life imprisonment, or a prison term of at least five years. The statute for child abuse resulting in death carries a higher statutory minimum: it is punishable by death, life imprisonment, or a prison term of at least seven years.
