Murder of Yun Geum-i



On October 28, 1992, 26-year-old South Korean sex worker Yun Geum-i was sexually assaulted and murdered by U.S. Private Kenneth Lee Markle III at a camp town in Dongducheon, Gyeonggi Province, South Korea.

The case sparked controversy and Anti-American sentiment, as well as advocacy for reviewing the U.S.–South Korea Status of Forces Agreement.

Murder
In 1992, Yun Geum-i, a kijichon (camptown) sex worker in the city Dongducheon, was killed by U.S. servicemen. Yun was found dead with a bottle stuffed into her vagina and an umbrella into her anus.

Aftermath
In August 1993, the U.S. government compensated the victim's family with about US$72,000. Markle III was imprisoned in Cheonan prison on May 17, 1994. In 1995, he was fined 2 million won (US$2,000) for causing a disturbance in prison. He was released on parole on August 14, 2006, and deported to the United States. He'd made seven previous applications for parole, but all of them had been rejected. Markle was arrested for various less serious crimes, including burglary, in Maryland. Markle died on February 14, 2023.

The murder of a prostitute did not itself spark a national debate about the prerogatives of the U.S. forces; on the other hand, the 1995 rape of a twelve-year-old Okinawan schoolgirl by three American servicemen (one U.S. Navy Seaman, two U.S. Marines) elicited much public outrage and brought wider attention to military-related violence against women.