Police officers escort a laywer, accused of assaulting his wife to her death, to the Seoul Central District Court, Dec. 12, 2023. Newsis

Prosecutors on Friday sought life imprisonment for a lawyer for allegedly murdering his wife late last year.

Prosecutors requested the Seoul Central District Court to sentence the 51-year-old man to life in prison, accusing him of murdering his wife despite having multiple opportunities to stop.

He is accused of striking his wife in the head with a blunt instrument and strangling her to death at his home last December. The couple had been separated and going through a divorce suit at the time.

Voice recordings from the victim's mobile phone at the time of the crime were played in court Friday, which included the victim's plea to her son at the scene to call the police and the 51-year-old calling his father, a former multiterm lawmaker, for help.

The defendant argued that it was not a premeditated crime, claiming the incident escalated after a physical altercation with his wife. (Yonhap)