The Boseong Serial Murders

The Boseong serial murders involved two attacks about a month apart in 2007. In each incident, travelers boarded a fishing boat operated by Oh Jong-geun. Four people were killed in total. The prosecution and courts found that the killings were connected to attempts to sexually assault female victims.

The first killings

On August 31, 2007, a teenage boy and girl visiting Boseong boarded Oh's boat. According to the prosecution account reported by Yonhap and The Korea Times, Oh pushed the male victim into the sea before attempting to sexually assault the female victim. When she resisted, she was also pushed into the water and died.

The file does not reproduce unnecessary physical detail. The central established fact is that both teenagers were killed during the boat trip and that the later conviction treated the deaths as intentional murders.

A second pair of victims

On September 25, 2007, while the first incident was already under police investigation, two female university students boarded the same fisherman's boat. Prosecutors said that Oh again attempted sexual assault and killed both women by forcing them into the sea.

The second incident was crucial to the case because it established a repeated pattern within weeks. Contemporary reporting consistently records four fatalities across the two episodes.

Arrest and prosecution

Oh was arrested and prosecuted for the murders. The Korea Times reported that the trial court rejected efforts to blame the victims for the attacks and emphasized both the repeated offending and the severe harm caused to the victims' families.

In February 2008, the Suncheon branch of the Gwangju District Court sentenced Oh to death. He continued to contest the case and also challenged the constitutionality of capital punishment.

The death-penalty challenge

During the appellate proceedings, the constitutional question surrounding the death penalty reached South Korea's Constitutional Court. In February 2010, the court upheld capital punishment in a 5–4 decision.

The constitutional ruling did not itself decide whether Oh was guilty. It resolved the legal challenge to the availability of the death penalty. His criminal appeal still had to be resolved separately.

Final judgment

On June 10, 2010, South Korea's Supreme Court rejected Oh's appeal and finalized the death sentence. Yonhap reported that this was the first finalized death sentence after the Constitutional Court's February 2010 ruling upholding capital punishment.

Because South Korea has not carried out an execution since December 1997, the final death sentence was not immediately executed. Oh remained imprisoned under the sentence.

Death in prison

In June 2025, Yonhap reported that Oh had died at Gwangju Prison around July 2024, at age 86, after years on death row. The same report, citing the Ministry of Justice and related authorities, stated that he had been South Korea's oldest death-row prisoner.

His death therefore ended the sentence without an execution. This distinction matters: the conviction and death sentence remained in force, but the state did not carry out the capital sentence.

Timeline

1. August 31, 2007
   First two victims killed

   A teenage boy and girl visiting Boseong are killed after boarding Oh's fishing boat.

2. September 25, 2007
   Second attack

   Two female university students are killed during another boat trip.

3. February 20, 2008
   Trial court imposes death sentence

   Oh is convicted and sentenced to death by the Suncheon branch of the Gwangju District Court.

4. February 25, 2010
   Constitutional Court upholds death penalty

   South Korea's Constitutional Court rejects the constitutional challenge to capital punishment by a 5–4 vote.

5. June 10, 2010
   Supreme Court finalizes sentence

   The Supreme Court rejects Oh's appeal, making the death sentence final.

6. Around July 2024
   Oh dies in prison

   Later reporting states that Oh died at Gwangju Prison while still under the unexecuted death sentence.

Current status

Solved / adjudicated. Oh Jong-geun was convicted of murdering four travelers in two incidents in 2007. His death sentence became final in 2010. He died in prison in 2024 without the sentence being carried out.