A man in his 70s accused of setting fire to two buildings in the Yeoksam neighborhood of Seoul's Gangnam district, injuring 19 people, has been placed under arrest.
Judge Boo Dong-sik of the Seoul Central District Court, who handles arrest warrants, issued a warrant on the 22nd for the suspect, identified only as A, citing the risk of flight. A faces charges including arson of an occupied structure resulting in injury. He is accused of setting fire on the 20th to the Hanyang Building and the Shinmyung Building in Yeoksam, which housed a patent law firm, leaving five people seriously injured and 14 with minor injuries.
Leaving Suseo Police Station on the 22nd to attend his detention hearing, A answered "yes" when reporters asked whether he had gone to see the patent attorney handling his case. Asked whether he had intended to kill anyone, however, he said: "Kill? I was trying to scare them. I wanted to let the world know about the fraud."
With A acknowledging that he had visited a specific patent attorney, police are working to establish his precise motive and whether he intended to kill. They are also seeking to obtain his medical records to determine whether he has a history of psychiatric illness, based in part on indications that he had shown a strong fixation on patent registration certificates.