Author Topic: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002  (Read 2451 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline mrswah

  • Senior Moderator
  • Sr. Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2169
  • Total likes: 796
  • Thinking outside the box, as usual-------
Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« on: May 07, 2021, 08:15:43 AM »
https://thetab.com/uk/2021/05/05/unsolved-an-alibi-for-omar-benguit-true-crime-jong-ok-shin-case-204043

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Crim/2014/690.html

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9545547


 in 2005, after three trials, Omar Benguit was convicted of   the murder of Jong Ok Shin, known as Oki, in 2002, in Bournemouth.

He has always protested his innocence, and his sister, Amie, campaigns for him.


An investigative journalist, Bronagh Munro, has taken up his case, and this week, there was a documentary about possible new evidence on BBC3. It is available on BBC i player.

Omar Benguit has multiple previous convictions , and has lost two appeals.  However, IMO, he is not guilty "beyond reasonable doubt".

What do people think?




« Last Edit: May 07, 2021, 08:24:46 AM by mrswah »

Offline Wonderfulspam

Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #1 on: May 07, 2021, 11:54:25 AM »
I hope the prosecution had a bit more evidence than dodgy witness testimony from prostitutes & crack heads.

I'll have to read up more.

Here is the BBC Documentary

Unsolved? BBC i player:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p09f7r28/unsolved-an-alibi-for-omar-episode-1
« Last Edit: May 08, 2021, 11:23:10 AM by Wonderfulspam »
I stand with Putin. Glory to Mother Putin.

Offline Wonderfulspam

Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #2 on: May 08, 2021, 10:36:54 AM »

The murder of Korean student Jong Ok-Shin occurred at about 2.50am on 12th July 2002 when she was walking home along Malmesbury Park Road in Bournemouth following a night out with friends. An assailant wearing a "mask" (according to her dying words) stabbed her several times in the back and she died later that morning in hospital.

About a month later a woman by the name of Beverly Brown was caught shoplifting and when interviewed for that offence on 22nd August 2002 she was found to have crucial information about the murder. She said that on the night in question she was travelling with three men in her car - Omar Benguit, Nicholas Gbadamosi and Delroy Woolry -   and that on entering the road where 'Oki' was walking (‘Oki’ was Jong Ok-Shin's nickname) the men jumped out and accosted the victim before running back to the car.

Ms Brown said Benguit was the murderer by virtue of the fact that when the three men returned to the car, she saw him with blood on his tee-shirt wrapping an object in a towel, which he then put into a shopping bag and stored under a seat, while Gbadamosi (one of the other men) who assisted him in the offence said "what have you done?" or words to that effect - the implication being that Benguit had just stabbed Oki.

Ms Brown had even more to say about the three men, which is that immediately after the murder she drove them all to a crack-house in Clements Road, Bournemouth, where they smoked crack cocaine. She then drove them to an unknown cul-de-sac, where the men took turns to rape her on "gravel" ground. She was able to give graphic and disturbing details of what took place: "red-handled pliers" were allegedly forced into her vagina and rectum; Woolry attempted to anally rape her; Gbadamosi forced her to perform oral sex which culminated with him ejaculating into her mouth; and both Benguit and Woolry ejaculated into her vagina.

Following this 'gang-rape' she then drove the three men to another house in Cunningham Crescent where Benguit had a shower to wash blood from himself. The towel he used together with his blood-stained clothing and knife were wrapped in a plastic bag and thrown by Gbadamosi into a river before Brown was finally allowed to return home to bathe.

On another occasion Gbadamosi had raped her at the Queen's Park Golf Club- again on "gravel" ground.

Delroy Woolry who was allegedly one of the passengers in Brown's car  was interviewed but not charged, but their finding of insufficient evidence did not cause them to ponder whether Brown might be telling them a pack of lies in respect to both her accusations of rape and the murder of Jong Ok-Shin.


1st Trial

Benguit was charged with the murder of Jong Ok-Shin, with Gbadamosi accused of assisting in the offence.They were jointly charged with raping Brown and Gbadamosi was also charged with the rape of Brown at the golf club.

The jury found Gbadamosi not guilty of rape but could not reach a verdict on whether he assisted Benguit in the murder. They were unable to reach verdicts in respect to Benguit, who had no idea where he was on the day in question.

2nd Trial

The prosecution continued to rely on Beverly Brown as a 'witness of truth' and retried Benguit  for both the murder of 'Oki' and the rape of Brown, while Gbadamosi was again charged with assisting in the murder.

Gbadamosi was able to locate CCTV evidence which showed that he was not with Brown as she claimed and a speeding camera had caught him late in the evening in another part of town. The jury found him not guilty of assisting an offender.

The jury found Mr Benguit not guilty of rape, but could not reach a verdict on the murder charge.

It is worth pausing here to note that no DNA from any of the three men or the victim could be found in Brown's car.

The CPS then applied for permission from the Director of Public Prosecutions Mr Kenneth Macdonald QC, to launch a 3rd trial, which was granted in January 2005. Lord Macdonald (as he is now known) is described on the internet as a "clever and resourceful man" and it is to be assumed that the investigating police officers and the CPS were no less capable of assessing the strength of the evidence against Benguit when deciding whether to continue to prosecute him.


3rd Trial - January 2005

The decision to continue with the prosecution was seemingly vindicated because Benguit was finally convicted of the murder of Jong Ok-Shin. New evidence was submitted for the first time which showed that Benguit possessed a knife similar to the murder weapon.  Mrs Justice Hallett rubbed salt into Benguit's wounds when sentencing him to life imprisonment by saying:

"This was a wicked crime...Poor Oki-Shin lies dead. Her family must mourn her terribly. From everything we have heard she was a lovely and kind girl. But for the courage of a number of your fellow addicts you would have walked free and you very nearly did. In my view on the evidence presented to this court you are a totally nasty piece of work and a very dangerous young man."

Detective Inspector Kevin Connolly of Dorset police who was in charge of the police investigation said:

"I would like to welcome today's outcome on behalf of Oki's parents. Today's verdict represents the imprisonment of a very violent and dangerous offender - whose sexual desires drove him to murder Oki. Many witnesses from the drug world gave evidence as they were appalled by Benguit's crimes and I would like to personally thank them. Omar Benguit has now been imprisoned which I hope assists Oki's family to come to terms with their tragic loss."


It is difficult to see what was so compelling about the evidence against Benguit  when the police had already been alerted to Danilo Restivo's possible connection with the murders of Oki-Shin and Heather Barnett.

We should leave aside the following considerations:

 1) Ms Brown was a prostitute / crack-addict with convictions for dishonesty who made complaints of sexual assault against her police handlers during the murder investigation, which Dorset police found to be false.

2) She originally named another person as the murderer!

3) She said the victim was walking on the wrong side of the street to where she was actually murdered.

4) She said Benguit liked Korean girls and had shouted out while passing Oki "Cor, look at the arse on that!"

5) She named three men who were allegedly travelling in her car and who jointly raped her later that morning after the murder - Benguit, Gbadamosi and Woolry. Gbadamosi was able to prove that he could not have been in the car as CCTV showed him to be somewhere else; Woolry was presumably not in the car because he was not charged by the police; Benguit could not say where he was on the night in question. No DNA belonging to any of the three men or the victim was discovered in her car.

6) The victim said before she died: "someone came from behind wearing a mask - he ran off and I saw my own blood" . No reference was made to Benguit having had with him a mask and the victim spoke of only one assailant - not three. 

7) She later appeared on the Jeremy Kyle show to say that she had actually seen Benguit plunge his knife into Oki-Shin, whereas at trial she had said she couldn't see the actual attack from where she was parked, but could only hear shouts as the three men ran back to her car (which none of the neighbours reported hearing).

A motley group of 14 crack addicts and 'smack heads' were assembled to provide highly incriminating evidence of Benguit's guilt. Dorset police should be commended for tracking them down as late as one year after the crime, particularly as all of them shared phenomenal memories about the background to the crime.

(1) Mr John Macleod corroborated Ms Brown's evidence by saying in the first trial that "on the morning following the murder, Benguit had blood on his shoes and he confessed he was behind Oki when she was stabbed in the back."

(2) Ms Leanne Meyers made a statement  in June 2003 saying how she remembered seeing Benguit in possession of a "15cm long knife with a serrated edge and a curved tip" around  the time of the murder in July 2002.  For some reason she thought it important to correct her statement by saying that " the cutting edge was actually straight and not serrated", which accurately described the murder weapon according to the forensic report.

(3) Amanda Kelly - reported Omar's 'confession'.

(4) John Kelly - reported Omar calling in at his house to wipe his hands on a towel in the early hours of the morning.

(5) Charlotte Johnson - reported Omar's drug taking and early morning visit.

(6) Victoria Ling - reported that Omar was sweaty, flustered and not normal following the crime.

(7) Joan Sheriden - reported on Omar's visit to crack house en route to the alleged rape.

(8) Richard Oliver - corroborating evidence

(9) Lisa Calamari - corroborating evidence

(10) Carla Mills - corroborating evidence

(11) Andrew Miller - corroborating evidence

(12) Emilene Roberts - corroborating evidence: “I was first asked about this on 7th November 2003, but one of the reasons it stuck in my mind is that I don’t normally sleep with men”.

(13) Suzanne Thomas - corroborating evidence

(14) Nicola Hazlett - corroborating evidence: "Members of the jury, you may think she was a completely useless witness who was so much out of it, she did not remember anything"...Mrs Justice Hallett.

(15) Mr Jonathan Cutting gave evidence to say he had seen Benguit sharpening "a six inch (15cm) long knife" in his house, although the witness could not remember when this occurred.

In reality, the only evidence which linked Omar Benguit to the murder of Jong Ok-Shin was the fact that he lived in the same town as her. Dorset police and the CPS fail to appreciate that even if all three men had been travelling in Brown's car as she claimed, CCTV evidence shows that her car was never in the vicinity of the crime at the relevant time.

http://www.homepage-link.to/JUSTICE/judgements/Benguit/index-1.html
I stand with Putin. Glory to Mother Putin.

Offline AerialHunter

Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #3 on: May 09, 2021, 12:41:55 PM »
I knew I'd missed something. Remember our discussion about the houses Mrs Wah?
This is right in the bracket.
There is none so noble or in receipt of his fellows unbridled adulation as that police officer who willingly deceives to protect one of his own kind and, by virtue of birthright, extends that privilege to his family.

Offline mrswah

  • Senior Moderator
  • Sr. Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2169
  • Total likes: 796
  • Thinking outside the box, as usual-------
Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #4 on: May 09, 2021, 07:04:10 PM »
The murder of Korean student Jong Ok-Shin occurred at about 2.50am on 12th July 2002 when she was walking home along Malmesbury Park Road in Bournemouth following a night out with friends. An assailant wearing a "mask" (according to her dying words) stabbed her several times in the back and she died later that morning in hospital.

About a month later a woman by the name of Beverly Brown was caught shoplifting and when interviewed for that offence on 22nd August 2002 she was found to have crucial information about the murder. She said that on the night in question she was travelling with three men in her car - Omar Benguit, Nicholas Gbadamosi and Delroy Woolry -   and that on entering the road where 'Oki' was walking (‘Oki’ was Jong Ok-Shin's nickname) the men jumped out and accosted the victim before running back to the car.

Ms Brown said Benguit was the murderer by virtue of the fact that when the three men returned to the car, she saw him with blood on his tee-shirt wrapping an object in a towel, which he then put into a shopping bag and stored under a seat, while Gbadamosi (one of the other men) who assisted him in the offence said "what have you done?" or words to that effect - the implication being that Benguit had just stabbed Oki.

Ms Brown had even more to say about the three men, which is that immediately after the murder she drove them all to a crack-house in Clements Road, Bournemouth, where they smoked crack cocaine. She then drove them to an unknown cul-de-sac, where the men took turns to rape her on "gravel" ground. She was able to give graphic and disturbing details of what took place: "red-handled pliers" were allegedly forced into her vagina and rectum; Woolry attempted to anally rape her; Gbadamosi forced her to perform oral sex which culminated with him ejaculating into her mouth; and both Benguit and Woolry ejaculated into her vagina.

Following this 'gang-rape' she then drove the three men to another house in Cunningham Crescent where Benguit had a shower to wash blood from himself. The towel he used together with his blood-stained clothing and knife were wrapped in a plastic bag and thrown by Gbadamosi into a river before Brown was finally allowed to return home to bathe.

On another occasion Gbadamosi had raped her at the Queen's Park Golf Club- again on "gravel" ground.

Delroy Woolry who was allegedly one of the passengers in Brown's car  was interviewed but not charged, but their finding of insufficient evidence did not cause them to ponder whether Brown might be telling them a pack of lies in respect to both her accusations of rape and the murder of Jong Ok-Shin.


1st Trial

Benguit was charged with the murder of Jong Ok-Shin, with Gbadamosi accused of assisting in the offence.They were jointly charged with raping Brown and Gbadamosi was also charged with the rape of Brown at the golf club.

The jury found Gbadamosi not guilty of rape but could not reach a verdict on whether he assisted Benguit in the murder. They were unable to reach verdicts in respect to Benguit, who had no idea where he was on the day in question.

2nd Trial

The prosecution continued to rely on Beverly Brown as a 'witness of truth' and retried Benguit  for both the murder of 'Oki' and the rape of Brown, while Gbadamosi was again charged with assisting in the murder.

Gbadamosi was able to locate CCTV evidence which showed that he was not with Brown as she claimed and a speeding camera had caught him late in the evening in another part of town. The jury found him not guilty of assisting an offender.

The jury found Mr Benguit not guilty of rape, but could not reach a verdict on the murder charge.

It is worth pausing here to note that no DNA from any of the three men or the victim could be found in Brown's car.

The CPS then applied for permission from the Director of Public Prosecutions Mr Kenneth Macdonald QC, to launch a 3rd trial, which was granted in January 2005. Lord Macdonald (as he is now known) is described on the internet as a "clever and resourceful man" and it is to be assumed that the investigating police officers and the CPS were no less capable of assessing the strength of the evidence against Benguit when deciding whether to continue to prosecute him.


3rd Trial - January 2005

The decision to continue with the prosecution was seemingly vindicated because Benguit was finally convicted of the murder of Jong Ok-Shin. New evidence was submitted for the first time which showed that Benguit possessed a knife similar to the murder weapon.  Mrs Justice Hallett rubbed salt into Benguit's wounds when sentencing him to life imprisonment by saying:

"This was a wicked crime...Poor Oki-Shin lies dead. Her family must mourn her terribly. From everything we have heard she was a lovely and kind girl. But for the courage of a number of your fellow addicts you would have walked free and you very nearly did. In my view on the evidence presented to this court you are a totally nasty piece of work and a very dangerous young man."

Detective Inspector Kevin Connolly of Dorset police who was in charge of the police investigation said:

"I would like to welcome today's outcome on behalf of Oki's parents. Today's verdict represents the imprisonment of a very violent and dangerous offender - whose sexual desires drove him to murder Oki. Many witnesses from the drug world gave evidence as they were appalled by Benguit's crimes and I would like to personally thank them. Omar Benguit has now been imprisoned which I hope assists Oki's family to come to terms with their tragic loss."


It is difficult to see what was so compelling about the evidence against Benguit  when the police had already been alerted to Danilo Restivo's possible connection with the murders of Oki-Shin and Heather Barnett.

We should leave aside the following considerations:

 1) Ms Brown was a prostitute / crack-addict with convictions for dishonesty who made complaints of sexual assault against her police handlers during the murder investigation, which Dorset police found to be false.

2) She originally named another person as the murderer!

3) She said the victim was walking on the wrong side of the street to where she was actually murdered.

4) She said Benguit liked Korean girls and had shouted out while passing Oki "Cor, look at the arse on that!"

5) She named three men who were allegedly travelling in her car and who jointly raped her later that morning after the murder - Benguit, Gbadamosi and Woolry. Gbadamosi was able to prove that he could not have been in the car as CCTV showed him to be somewhere else; Woolry was presumably not in the car because he was not charged by the police; Benguit could not say where he was on the night in question. No DNA belonging to any of the three men or the victim was discovered in her car.

6) The victim said before she died: "someone came from behind wearing a mask - he ran off and I saw my own blood" . No reference was made to Benguit having had with him a mask and the victim spoke of only one assailant - not three. 

7) She later appeared on the Jeremy Kyle show to say that she had actually seen Benguit plunge his knife into Oki-Shin, whereas at trial she had said she couldn't see the actual attack from where she was parked, but could only hear shouts as the three men ran back to her car (which none of the neighbours reported hearing).

A motley group of 14 crack addicts and 'smack heads' were assembled to provide highly incriminating evidence of Benguit's guilt. Dorset police should be commended for tracking them down as late as one year after the crime, particularly as all of them shared phenomenal memories about the background to the crime.

(1) Mr John Macleod corroborated Ms Brown's evidence by saying in the first trial that "on the morning following the murder, Benguit had blood on his shoes and he confessed he was behind Oki when she was stabbed in the back."

(2) Ms Leanne Meyers made a statement  in June 2003 saying how she remembered seeing Benguit in possession of a "15cm long knife with a serrated edge and a curved tip" around  the time of the murder in July 2002.  For some reason she thought it important to correct her statement by saying that " the cutting edge was actually straight and not serrated", which accurately described the murder weapon according to the forensic report.

(3) Amanda Kelly - reported Omar's 'confession'.

(4) John Kelly - reported Omar calling in at his house to wipe his hands on a towel in the early hours of the morning.

(5) Charlotte Johnson - reported Omar's drug taking and early morning visit.

(6) Victoria Ling - reported that Omar was sweaty, flustered and not normal following the crime.

(7) Joan Sheriden - reported on Omar's visit to crack house en route to the alleged rape.

(8) Richard Oliver - corroborating evidence

(9) Lisa Calamari - corroborating evidence

(10) Carla Mills - corroborating evidence

(11) Andrew Miller - corroborating evidence

(12) Emilene Roberts - corroborating evidence: “I was first asked about this on 7th November 2003, but one of the reasons it stuck in my mind is that I don’t normally sleep with men”.

(13) Suzanne Thomas - corroborating evidence

(14) Nicola Hazlett - corroborating evidence: "Members of the jury, you may think she was a completely useless witness who was so much out of it, she did not remember anything"...Mrs Justice Hallett.

(15) Mr Jonathan Cutting gave evidence to say he had seen Benguit sharpening "a six inch (15cm) long knife" in his house, although the witness could not remember when this occurred.

In reality, the only evidence which linked Omar Benguit to the murder of Jong Ok-Shin was the fact that he lived in the same town as her. Dorset police and the CPS fail to appreciate that even if all three men had been travelling in Brown's car as she claimed, CCTV evidence shows that her car was never in the vicinity of the crime at the relevant time.

http://www.homepage-link.to/JUSTICE/judgements/Benguit/index-1.html


I hadn't realised there had been a documentary on the case 3 years back; I just happened to watch the one last week.

I spent yesterday evening catching up!


Offline mrswah

  • Senior Moderator
  • Sr. Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2169
  • Total likes: 796
  • Thinking outside the box, as usual-------
Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #5 on: May 09, 2021, 07:05:34 PM »
I knew I'd missed something. Remember our discussion about the houses Mrs Wah?
This is right in the bracket.

It did occur to me while I was watching the documentary.

Offline Wonderfulspam

Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #6 on: May 09, 2021, 07:25:06 PM »
It did occur to me while I was watching the documentary.

I didn't make it through the whole docu I'm afraid, but I agree with you from what I've read that this conviction is unsafe.

No DNA, Forensics, a key witness who changed her story 3 times & that Gbadamosi fella was proven never to have been in her car.

Add to that, the witness claimed the 3 men jumped out & tried chatting OKI up, before being spurned & hence stabbing her, yet Oki never mentioned any of that in her dying words.

When was Benguit supposed to have donned a mask anyway?  Before chatting OKI up, during or after? 

It doesn't make any sense.

I stand with Putin. Glory to Mother Putin.

Offline mrswah

  • Senior Moderator
  • Sr. Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2169
  • Total likes: 796
  • Thinking outside the box, as usual-------
Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #7 on: May 09, 2021, 10:06:57 PM »
I didn't make it through the whole docu I'm afraid, but I agree with you from what I've read that this conviction is unsafe.

No DNA, Forensics, a key witness who changed her story 3 times & that Gbadamosi fella was proven never to have been in her car.

Add to that, the witness claimed the 3 men jumped out & tried chatting OKI up, before being spurned & hence stabbing her, yet Oki never mentioned any of that in her dying words.

When was Benguit supposed to have donned a mask anyway?  Before chatting OKI up, during or after? 

It doesn't make any sense.

Even the woman who owned/ran the "crack house" later admitted she had lied about Benguit having been there.

Mind you, I'm not sure there's enough evidence to say Restivo did it.

Offline Nicholas

Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #8 on: May 09, 2021, 10:35:36 PM »
I didn't make it through the whole docu I'm afraid, but I agree with you from what I've read that this conviction is unsafe.


Unsafe convictions don’t equate to killers being factually innocent 
Who wants to take on this great massive lie?” Writer Martin Preib on the tsunami of innocence fraud sweeping our nation

Offline mrswah

  • Senior Moderator
  • Sr. Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2169
  • Total likes: 796
  • Thinking outside the box, as usual-------
Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #9 on: May 10, 2021, 11:27:31 AM »
Unsafe convictions don’t equate to killers being factually innocent

No, they don't necessarily.

Do you think Benguit is guilty? 

Offline Wonderfulspam

Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #10 on: May 12, 2021, 10:10:02 AM »
Unsafe convictions don’t equate to killers being factually innocent

No, they don't necessarily.

Do you think Benguit is guilty? 
I was waiting for the answer but it didn't come so have mine instead.
Benguit is a dodgy druggie with 60+ convictions. It's not unreasonable to believe he could stab someone to death.
But, the evidence I've read....the lying star witness, other witnesses who claimed they were coerced by the police.
The whole when did he put a mask on scenario....it doesn't add up & if I had to make a choice I think there's too much reasonable doubt & not enough firm evidence. I'd have to find him not guilty.
I stand with Putin. Glory to Mother Putin.

Offline mrswah

  • Senior Moderator
  • Sr. Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 2169
  • Total likes: 796
  • Thinking outside the box, as usual-------
Re: Omar Benguit and the Murder of Jong Ok Shin in 2002
« Reply #11 on: May 12, 2021, 04:21:47 PM »
I was waiting for the answer but it didn't come so have mine instead.
Benguit is a dodgy druggie with 60+ convictions. It's not unreasonable to believe he could stab someone to death.
But, the evidence I've read....the lying star witness, other witnesses who claimed they were coerced by the police.
The whole when did he put a mask on scenario....it doesn't add up & if I had to make a choice I think there's too much reasonable doubt & not enough firm evidence. I'd have to find him not guilty.


I was waiting for the answer too!!

I agree with you one hundred per cent.