California man pleads guilty to killings of five people in 2008

By Steve Gorman LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A California man charged with killing his ex-wife and four others in 2008, then torching her home, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to murder and arson in a plea deal that could spare him the death sentence if he testifies against a co-defendant. As part of the plea agreement, Jae Shim, 45, of Palmdale, admitted to lying in wait to kill his victims, then using a Samurai sword and baseball bat to stab and beat them to death in June 2008, prosecutors said. The bodies of his former spouse, Jenny Young Park, 34, her 13-year-old daughter, Jamie, her 11-year-old son, Justin, and a 60-year-old relative, Joseph Ciganek, were found in the ruins of a home they shared in the desert community of Quartz Hill, north of Los Angeles. The remains of Park's boyfriend, Si Young Yoon, 34, missing since the day of the slayings, were found in Mexico in December by authorities acting on information Shim provided as part of his plea agreement, according to the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office. In court on Wednesday, Shim entered guilty pleas to five counts of first-degree murder and a single count of arson. "I am guilty," he said through a Korean interpreter when asked his plea to the last three murder charges, according to the City News Service. Shim is facing five consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole when he returns to court in May for sentencing, the district attorney's office said in a statement. Prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty for Shim if he agrees to testify against his co-defendant in the slayings, Steve Kwon, who is awaiting trial on five counts of murder, one count of arson and one count of being an accessory after the fact. If convicted, Kwon is facing a maximum sentence of life in prison without parole, the district attorney's office said. (Reporting by Steve Gorman; Editing by Peter Cooney)