The Itaewon Burger King murder trial has started with former convict for the murder Edward Lee pointing the finger at Arthur John Patterson as the murderer of Korean student Cho Choong-pil:
John Arthur Patterson
During the questioning, Lee found it difficult to recall the situation in which the murder took place in April 1997, but the Korean-American said in the courtroom that he saw Patterson suddenly turning to the victim and stabbing him.
“When the murder took place, I went to the bathroom to wash my hands,” he said. “Patterson suddenly started to stab him. I turned around and I was shocked.
“Cho was trying to hit the accused with his right hand, but Patterson stabbed him and kept stabbing him.”
He admitted that there were only three people including Patterson, Cho and himself at the crime scene. But he continued to accuse Patterson of murdering Cho.
He also took issue with the credibility of the past investigation records and how he was treated during the questioning by the police and prosecutors.
“I have consistently asked for an interpreter, but they didn’t provide me with one,” he said. “I was interrogated without an interpreter, coerced and threated during the first investigation for 17 hours. They didn’t let me go to sleep.” [Korea Herald]
You can read the rest at the link, but Patterson continues to claim that Lee is the actual murderer. I feel so bad for the victim’s mother who also testified and had to listen to the details about how her son was killed for no reason and then see these two each deny responsibility. Even if Lee did not commit the murder he is still culpable for not saying anything after it happened. If he saw Patterson stabbing someone to death he should of at least immediately alerted people in the restaurant to call the police and paramedics.
