Strangled Korean businessman identified

Police have now identified the Korean businessman who was found dead and hogtied last Friday morning inside a room in his own apartment building in Chalan Laulau.

In a media briefing yesterday afternoon, Department of Public Safety spokesman Eric David said the victim was Kim Sang Sik, a Korean doing business on Saipan.

He earlier said the man owns the SRC building apartment on Middle Road across the corner of Quartermaster Road. Police said that Kim also owned SRC Pacific Inc. and was born on Jan. 6, 1939.

David said an autopsy on the body, conducted at 7pm on the same day the victim was found dead in his apartment, showed that the victim sustained multiple head injuries from a blunt object.

Forensic expert Dr. Aurelio Espinola flew in from Guam to perform the autopsy. Espinola later released the result to the DPS and confirmed that the victim sustained head injuries.

Earlier reports had said that the victim had died of strangulation. David said that he has yet to confirm whether the object used to commit the crime was found at the crime scene.

Suspects have yet to be identified, said David, and the case is still under investigation. He also did not state any motives for the homicide, adding that he has yet to find out if there were any properties stolen from scene of the crime.

David said initial investigation revealed that about 2am, the victim’s wife, still unidentified, had arrived at the Francisco C. Ada/Saipan International Airport from China after being away for a month for medical check-up.

She related to the police that she was calling her husband to pick her up at the airport but she said she did not get any answer. She then called a taxicab to take her to their apartment.

The victim’s wife said she knocked on the door several times, but there was no answer. This prompted her to go around the apartment and enter their house through the balcony’s sliding door and that was when she found her husband’s lifeless body on the floor.

The wife then ran up to their tenants and banged on their doors asking for help. She said Bill Rathburn appeared and reported the incident to DPS. David said Rathburn is also connected to the DPS, working on their computers and is in charge of crime statistics in the CNMI.

“We are trying to cover all the loopholes,” said David.

He said the wife has not been ruled out yet as a suspect in the investigation.