Worried relative finds 81-year-old’s burned body in ransacked California home, cops say
.png "“You’re paralyzed, you’re in disbelief,” Clara Kim, Kim’s daughter, said at the news conference, NBC Los Angeles reported. “I mean, to this day we wake up and think this is all a dream.”")
When 81-year-old Ok Ja Kim didn’t show for a family function in August, a worried relative went to check on her at her California home.
The relative found Kim’s burned body in her bedroom at the Woodland Hills home, the Los Angeles Police Department said in an August news release.
Police are investigating her death as a homicide, but have not made an arrest.
With no suspect or suspects identified, the “city of Los Angeles is offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the identification, arrest and prosecution” of a suspect in her death, according to a Thursday, Oct. 20, news release from LAPD.
When officers arrived on Aug. 2 at the ransacked home, which had “evidence of a forced entry and of a possible burglary,” police said they found Kim lying on her bedroom floor partially under the bed.
“She was semi-charred, unconscious and not breathing,” according to police, and the Los Angeles Fire Department pronounced her dead at the scene.
Through further investigation, police said they determined that Kim was “brutally murdered.” She had “blunt force injuries” and had been “strangled during a home invasion robbery.”
The victim’s daughter, Clara Kim, said during a Thursday news conference that she thinks the public needs to know the details of the crime, KTLA 5 News reported.
“They need to understand that we are all vulnerable to a level of vulgarity and disgust that just exists in this world, and people need to act,” Clara Kim said, the outlet reported. “This could have been anyone’s family. This could have been your mom, this could have been your dad.”
‘Senseless and brutal act of murder’
Clara Kim said her mother, who lived alone, was hard-working and “just entering her golden years,” ABC 7 News reported.
“You’re paralyzed, you’re in disbelief,” Clara Kim said at the news conference, NBC Los Angeles reported. “I mean, to this day we wake up and think this is all a dream.”
Los Angeles Councilmember Bob Blumenfield, who represents the district Kim lived in, described the crime to ABC 7 News as unprecedented.
“This is a horrific crime that I have not, that we have not, experienced during my tenure,” Blumenfield told the outlet.
Los Angeles police detective Sharon Kim echoed Blumenfield’s sentiment when speaking with KTLA 5 News.
“I have worked many years in homicide and even more than that investigating violent crime, and I can honestly say that in my entire career I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a senseless and brutal act of murder,” LAPD Detective Kim told the outlet.
Anyone with information is asked to contact police at 1-877-LAPD-24-7 (1-877-527-3247).
Woodland Hills is about 25 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles.
This story was originally published October 21, 2022 at 1:38 PM with the headline "Worried relative finds 81-year-old’s burned body in ransacked California home, cops say."
