South Korea’s top military court on Thursday ordered a lower court to reconsider the ruling that jailed four sergeants and corporals for beating a junior soldier to death, questioning the murder charge applied on three of them as accomplices.

The court upheld the murder charge for a sergeant, surnamed Lee, for physically abusing a 23-year-old private first class Yoon Seung-joo to death, but differed on the other three equally accused of murdering Yoon as accomplices. 

“The murder charge can be applied to Lee, but it is difficult to see the other three intended to murder the victim,” the court said in the ruling. 

The court pointed out that the three might have been under pressure from the 27-year-old Lee to bully Yoon, as Lee held leadership in the barracks. It also took into account that the three abused Yoon to lesser degrees and tried to save him when the junior solider collapsed.

Last year, the lower court sentenced Lee to 35 years for murdering Yoon, while other sergeants and corporals involved received between 10 and 12 years in jail for killing him as accomplices. 

Yoon died in April 2014 after allegedly being hit in the chest by fellow enlisted soldiers at their barracks while eating snacks. The military says the assault caused a piece of food to obstruct his airway, leading him to die of asphyxiation.

The accused reportedly constantly bullied and beat Yoon in the month before his death, making him lick their spittle off the floor or eat toothpaste. They also forcefully prevented him from sleeping. 

The case shed light on the problems of bullying in the military and its abusive culture in the country where all able-bodied man must serve about two years as conscripts to deter aggressions from North Korea. 

By Ock Hyun-ju (laeticia.ock@heraldcorp.com)