{"id":253314,"date":"2026-03-26T18:57:06","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T09:57:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tenbizt.com\/en\/news\/uncategorized\/2026\/03\/26\/controversial-legacy-lee-geun-infamous-torturer\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T16:35:00","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T07:35:00","slug":"controversial-legacy-lee-geun-infamous-torturer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tenbizt.com\/en\/news\/military\/2026\/03\/26\/controversial-legacy-lee-geun-infamous-torturer\/","title":{"rendered":"The Controversial Legacy of Lee Geun-an: The Infamous Torturer Dies at 88"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Translation result <\/p>\n<p>Lee Geun-an, notorious as a torture specialist during South Korea\u2019s military regimes, has died at the age of 88.<\/p>\n<p>Lee had been staying in a nursing hospital in Seoul after his health declined and died on the 25th. His body is currently at a hospital in Dongdaemun, Seoul. Funeral rites are scheduled for the 27th.<\/p>\n<p>He served as a counterintelligence investigator at the Public Security Headquarters in the 1970s and 1980s and became infamous for brutal interrogation techniques, including water torture (waterboarding), electric shocks and dislocating suspects\u2019 joints.<\/p>\n<p>Lee was involved in investigations such as the 1979 Namminjeon case, the 1985 fabricated spy case against abducted fisherman Kim Seong-hak, and the 1986 Anti-Imperialist Alliance case. Authorities say he tortured suspects during those probes. In 1981, he received a commendation from the minister of home affairs for his role in the Seoul National University Murim case.<\/p>\n<p>After South Korea\u2019s democratization, Lee was placed on a wanted list in December 1988 on charges of torturing Kim Geun-tae, the former leader of the Youth Federation for the Democratization Movement, and he spent 12 years on the run.<\/p>\n<p>He surrendered in October 1999. In September 2000, the Supreme Court sentenced him to seven years in prison and imposed a seven-year suspension of civil rights; he was released in 2006. In 2024, a court ordered him to pay 700 million KRW (about $469,000) to the family of an abducted fisherman who had been detained as a suspected spy and died in custody.<\/p>\n<p>After his release, Lee participated in religious activities and said he regretted his past, but he continued to make controversial remarks. In a 2010 interview, when asked about being called a \u201ctorture specialist,\u201d he said, \u201cThose who try to defend themselves and investigators who try to break them engage in an intense battle of wits. In that sense, interrogation is an art.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>At a 2012 event marking the publication of his autobiography, he defended past actions, saying, \u201cCatching spies and ideological offenders back then was patriotic. If it weren\u2019t patriotism, who would have risked their lives working so hard?\u201d<\/p>\n<div>\n<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/contents-cdn.viewus.co.kr\/image\/2026\/03\/CP-2023-0188\/image-76878dee-c1d3-4598-b9e3-8dc57295e512.jpeg\" alt=\"&nbsp;   \u25b2Former Police Superintendent Lee Geun-an, widely known as a torture specialist for leading investigations into pro-democracy figures under the military regime, died on the 25th at age 88. Lee reportedly lost his wife in early 2023 and had been living alone in Seoul; his health recently declined and he entered a nursing hospital. The photo shows Lee at his 2012 autobiography publication event. \u00a9 Yonhap News\" \/><figcaption>&nbsp;   \u25b2Former Police Superintendent Lee Geun-an, widely known as a torture specialist for leading investigations into pro-democracy figures under the military regime, died on the 25th at age 88. Lee reportedly lost his wife in early 2023 and had been living alone in Seoul; his health recently declined and he entered a nursing hospital. The photo shows Lee at his 2012 autobiography publication event. \u00a9 Yonhap News<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Notorious for his torture techniques during the military regime, Lee Geun-an passed away at 88, recently hospitalized due to health issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_thumbnail_url":"https:\/\/contents-cdn.viewus.co.kr\/image\/2026\/03\/CP-2023-0188\/image-76878dee-c1d3-4598-b9e3-8dc57295e512.jpeg","footnotes":""},"categories":[278104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-253314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-military"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Controversial Legacy of Lee Geun-an: The Infamous Torturer Dies at 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