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2017 'Molar Daddy' murder exposes sexual depravity, police incompetence and false facades

Published: 19 Aug. 2025, 07:00 Updated: 06 Oct. 2025, 23:45

LEE SOO-JUNG
[email protected]

Lee Young-hak stares at a camera while entering the Seoul Northern District Court for the first trial on his murder of a 14-year-old girl on Nov. 17, 2017. [NEWS1]

[KOREAN CRIME FILES #4]

Behind the glitz and glamour seen in pop culture, Korea’s grimmest and most harrowing crime stories, some more well-known than others, continue to haunt society today. The Korea JoongAng Daily takes a deep dive into some of these stories, sharing a glimpse into the darker side of society as well as the most up-to-date known facts. – Ed.

On a Saturday afternoon in late September 2017, a 14-year-old girl walked into her friend’s home. She’d been lured by the promise of watching a movie starring a K-pop idol.

However, there was no movie. The girl fell asleep. She didn’t drift off by choice — she was drugged with sleep-inducing pills handed to her by the friend she trusted.

Her phone was discarded, cutting off any way to trace her.

A week after she went missing, her body was found on a remote mountain in Gangwon, two hours from where she was drugged.

The crime

Lee Young-hak, center, reconstructs putting a suitcase with the victim's body into his vehicle in Jungnang District, eastern Seoul, on Oct. 11, 2017. [JOINT PRESS CORPS]

When the girl arrived at her friend's house in Jungnang District in eastern Seoul on that fateful afternoon, she thought she was there to watch a movie. Instead, she was walking into a trap planned days in advance by the friend’s father — and prepared by the friend herself.

The day before, Lee Young-hak had crushed Stilnox sleeping pills into a beverage and told his daughter to serve it. On Sept. 30, the victim drank it without suspicion. Her friend then handed her two more Stilnox tablets, saying they were vitamins. She swallowed them — and soon collapsed, helpless.

At 3:40 p.m., Lee’s daughter left the house with her unconscious friend’s cell phone in her hand. She turned it off at a local market and hid it in the basement of her former home as Lee instructed — a move to fake the abduction as a teenage runaway.

Inside the home, there was only the 36-year-old Lee and the 14-year-old girl. Lee strapped the victim’s arms and legs and sexually assaulted her. To ensure she remained unconscious, Lee injected fluid from melted Stilnox pills into her mouth using a syringe.

That evening, the elder Lee went out. He retrieved the victim’s phone and then tossed it away near a stream in Uijeongbu, Gyeonggi. He returned home at 10:08 p.m.

An image implying sexual harassment [YONHAP NEWS TV]

His assault continued overnight. The victim was still unconscious.

The day after, the victim woke up as Lee groped her. She resisted. The victim saw his face and screamed, “Who are you?”

Lee did not answer. Instead, he pressed a wet towel over her face and strangled her using a tie. Then, he whispered to her, “Sorry, I will burn forever in hell," according to a 2018 ruling by the Seoul High Court.

That evening, Lee and his daughter ate dinner together as if nothing had happened. Later, they sprayed fungicidal fluid on the victim's body and put her in a suitcase.

Surveillance camera footage shows the moment when Lee and his daughter put an object suspected to be a suitcase carrying the victim's body into Lee's vehicle on Oct. 1, 2017. [SEOUL JUNGNANG POLICE STATION]

That night, Oct. 1, the father and daughter drove to Yeongwol County in Gangwon. Under the cover of darkness, they discarded the victim’s body on a mountain. However, the two did not return home. They holed up in a studio in Dobong District — a shelter provided by Lee's friend.

On Oct. 3, three days after receiving a missing-person report, police found that the victim had last been spotted entering Lee’s house in Seoul’s Jungnang district. On Oct. 5, police arrested Lee and his daughter. The day after, police found the victim's body during a search accompanied by Lee.

At first, Lee denied killing her. Then, on Oct. 10, he admitted it.

Molar Daddy's false public image

Lee Young-hak, left, and his daughter and wife, center, appear in a TV show to tell their stories about their illness. [SCREEN CAPTURE]

Lee and his daughter were already well-known public figures.

The pair had made multiple TV appearances as the only Korean patients suffering from gigantiform cementoma, a rare form of genetic dental tumors. They lost nearly all their teeth, with just a few molars left.

A book authored by Lee Young-hak, which depicts hardship and efforts Lee faced as a patient of autosomal dental tumor and a father.[KYOBO BOOKSTORE]

In 2007, Lee authored a book titled “Molar Daddy’s Happiness.” He cultivated the public persona of a hard-working and devoted father with the nickname “Molar Daddy.”

The TV appearances and the books led to an outpouring of public sympathy, and a total of 1.2 billion won ($876,000) was donated to the family.

But rather than medical care, Lee spent the money on several foreign cars and full-body tattoos. Only 7.5 million won was used to treat his daughter’s disease.

Once the money dried up, Lee turned to an illegal yet lucrative business: an adult massage parlor. The hostess was his wife.

Lee forced his wife to offer sexual services to male customers. He even filmed the encounters.

The exploitation ended with the death of his wife on Sept. 6, 2017.

Yet, her death left some disturbing clues — at least about Lee’s sexual depravity.

A photo of Lee Young-hak, which was posted on his social media account. [YONHAP]

His wife had accused Lee’s stepfather of sexually abusing her over the years. Lee’s reaction was strange. Rather than leaping to her defense, Lee asked her to orchestrate another encounter with him to collect evidence.

His wife did so, and then Lee turned on her, accusing her of taking their relationship "lightly." His wife replied, "I will show you love," and then jumped out the bathroom window, according to the 2018 court verdict.

Lee’s stepfather killed himself two months later, in November 2017.

After his wife died, Lee reportedly relied on a human-sized doll to fulfill his urges. But it was not long before he started looking for somebody to fill his wife's vacancy. He dragged his daughter into his scheme as an accomplice — more specifically, a kidnapper.

Lee eventually handpicked the victim from a picture of his daughter's friends. He chose her because he said she looked the most like his wife.

Trial and sentencing

Lee Young-hak arrives at the Seoul High Court in southern Seoul in September 2018 for an appellate trial on his murder of a 14-year-old girl. [YONHAP]

According to a prosecutorial evaluation, Lee exhibited narcissistic traits and had an IQ of about 86.

The assessment cited a fixation on “tough” masculinity and a tendency to target vulnerable people. It also said he was likely to explicitly express his desires to vulnerable subjects.

A local court sentenced the older Lee to death in 2018. The Seoul Northern District Court said his crime was “inhumane and brutal,” noting he should be “separated from society permanently.”

After an appeal, the Seoul High Court reduced his punishment to a life sentence.

Lee Young-hak's daughter, who lured and kidnapped her friend, heads toward the Seoul Northern District Court in Dobong District for her questioning session before issuance of her detention warrant on Oct. 30 in 2017. [YONHAP]

The appellate court found the kidnapping was premeditated, but that the murder was “impulsive,” driven by fear that his identity would be revealed.

The court also cited his rare disease and childhood poverty as factors in his underdeveloped moral and sexual judgment.

Lee’s daughter was also convicted. She received four to six years of imprisonment after being found guilty of kidnapping a minor and abandoning the corpse.

The local court ruled that she “enticed the victim despite knowing about potential sexual abuse.” The court said the younger Lee “destroyed the trust between friends.”

The appellate and Supreme Courts upheld the local court's ruling against the teenage accomplice.

Ramifications of the crime did not end with the two being punished. Year-end public donations reportedly dropped by around 10 percent after Lee's misappropriation of donations was revealed, leading people to question the transparency of the usage of the donated funds.

State responsibility

Mother of the 14-year-old victim visits the Mangu patrol station to report her daughter's missing on Sep. 30, 2017. [YONHAP]

Police were also found to have mishandled the case — especially during the critical window when the victim was still alive.

At about 11:30 p.m. on Sept. 30 — roughly 13 hours before the murder — the victim’s mother reported her missing.

In an October 2017 interview with SBS, the mother said she gave police the name of Lee’s daughter at the Mangu patrol station. She also told them that Lee’s daughter was likely the last person to see her child.

Officers failed to act on those clues — even as the mother spoke with Lee’s daughter by phone — and took no timely steps to find the girl.

In May 2019, the Seoul Central District Court found that police negligence accounted for 30 percent of the death and awarded the victim's family 180 million won in damages.

In December 2019, an appellate court raised the state accountability to 40 percent, with compensation of 240 million won.

The Seoul High Court ruled that “police could have easily located the victim if they had investigated Lee’s daughter.”

Three parties were held responsible for the teenager's death: the killer, Lee Young-hak; his daughter, as an accomplice; and the police, for negligence.

However, Lee has shown little remorse in prison, even urging his daughter to help him take revenge.

“Wait a year, let’s take revenge,” Lee wrote in a letter to his daughter in 2022. “I am writing a book titled, 'I Am a Murderer.'”

BY LEE SOO-JUNG [[email protected]]

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2017 'Molar Daddy' murder exposes sexual depravity, police incompetence and false facades

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