A teacher st@bbed an eight-year-old student to de@th at an elementary school in South Korea on Monday, Feb. 10, local media reported, citing authorities.
The teacher, a woman in her 40s, confessed to the crime after police officers found her and the young girl with st@b wounds in the audiovisual room at the elementary school in the central city of Daejeon on Monday evening, the Yonhap news agency reported.
The girl, identified as Kim Ha-Neul, was brought to hospital “in an unconscious state, but she later d!ed,” the report read.
The teacher had stab wounds on her neck and arm, which officials determined may have been self-inflicted, according to the news agency.
“Police found that the teacher had taken a leave of absence due to depression and returned to the school late last year,” the report said.
The student was at the school for after-class child care before she was due to attend a private art class.
The teacher and the girl were found by police at around 6:00 pm (0900 GMT) after the child’s parents reported her missing from the art class.
The teacher underwent surgery for her wounds, and police said they would resume questioning her later, Yonhap reported.
The teacher reportedly said she stabbed Ha-Neul to de@th at school because she was angry for not being allowed to teach students after returning to work following her leave of absense due to depression, according to the police on Tuesday.
The teacher and her victim did not know each other beforehand, police added.
The suspect told police that she lured Kim into the room by offering her a book, then str@ngled and stabbed the girl, police said.
The teacher said she was angry for being prohibited from teaching. She said she was angry at the vice principal who made that decision.
Police said they are looking into that claim.
The suspect said she was looking for a student to target randomly, according to police. She had simply planned to attack the last student coming out of the classroom, and Kim was unfortunate to be the last child to leave that day. The suspect also claimed she planned to k!ll herself afterward.
Police said they found that the suspect had bought a knife at a store near the school during the lunch break, hours before the attack.
Investigators said they will detain her for further questioning on suspicion of premeditated murd£r.
Kim was waiting for a shuttle bus to arrive after the school’s after-school program ended. When she did not show up at 4:40 p.m. for her private art class, the academy called her family about 10 minutes later, which alarmed them and prompted a police search.
Kim’s father said he sensed that she could be in danger as he heard unusual sounds in real time through an app installed in her mobile phone.
“From 4:50 p.m., I didn’t hear Ha-neul’s voice. I could only hear a gasping sound from an old lady as if she was panting after running, as well as sounds of someone opening and closing a drawer and unzipping something like a bag,” he told reporters.
About an hour later, Kim’s grandmother found the teacher at the audiovisual room covered with bl00d, so she alerted police officers to search her and the room, where they also found the girl.
According to the police and the regional education authority, the teacher took a leave of absence from Dec. 9, 2024, over symptoms of depression. She was expected to take six months off, but came back after about 20 days, expressing her intention to return to work early and submitting a medical certificate claiming she was ready to return to the classroom, according to an official at the Daejeon Metropolitan City Office of Education.
Only four days before the k!lling, the suspect showed violent behavior toward a colleague after simply being asked how she was doing.
According to Kim’s father, dozens of stab wounds were found all over the child’s body, including on her hands — indicating that she resisted.
“Police told me not to look at my daughter’s body at the storage (inside the audiovisual room) because it would be difficult … My daughter became a star in the sky. There should never be another case like Ha-neul’s,” the father said. “I hope the government will come up with measures to prevent such incidents from happening again by pushing to revise the law or strengthen rules on teachers with a history of mental health problems.”
The bereaved father also told reporters at the mortuary on the Feb. 11, “Please pray so that this does not happen again in Korea.”
The bereaved family explained, “We decided to disclose the child’s name and face because we thought that a second sky should never occur again.”
Mourners continued to visit the mortuary to mourn Ha-Neul and comfort her family.
Beginning Tuesday morning, a stream of citizens mourning her death visited the school to leave chrysanthemums, dolls and sweets at the school gate.
