News

Norcross spa shooter acquitted of murder charges in 1990

NORCROSS, Ga.,None — Channel 2 Action News has uncovered new information about the man police saidshot and killed his family and himself in a shooting rampage.

Channel 2's Kerry Kavanaugh dug through records and discovered a history of family violence and the gunman's past connection to another murder case.

Court records from April 2006 show the family of Jueng Soo Paek feared his violent tendencies long before Tuesday's mass shooting.

Norcross police said Paek went to the Su Jung Health Sauna on Buford Highway, a family-owned business, and killed his two sisters, their husbands, then himself.

In Paek's file, Kavanaugh found one of his victims, his sister Kum Song, filed for a temporary protective order, or TPO, while Paek was serving time for assaulting her.

She wrote to a judge, "I am concerned that he is becoming more threatening and wants to harm us with his guns. My brother has also threatened to commit suicide with his guns."

The judge granted the petition and ordered the sheriff's department to remove all weapons from Paek's home.

According to the Gwinnett County Sheriff's Office, in April 2006 deputies seized a shotgun and two handguns from Paek's home, but, they said the law says after the six-month TPO expired, he had every right to come back and reclaim his property.

Nearly six years later, police said Paek used a .45-caliber gun during Tuesday's shooting.

Acting on a tip, Kavanaugh also made a call to Jefferson Parrish, La. , where the district attorney's office confirmed that Paek faced three counts of first-degree murder there in 1989. Paek's boss and his two son's were shot and killed.

Prosecutors in that trial accused Paek of killing the three men, and then turning the gun on himself in a suicide attempt, during which he lost his eye.

The jury did not buy the prosecution's theories and acquitted Paek in a May 1990 trial.

Because the case is more than 20 years old, details from it were not immediately available on Friday.

As for a motive in the Norcross shooting, police are still investigating. But several family friends said the business had been struggling financially.

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