Announced 17 results of direct·supplementary investigations over the past three months
The prosecution launched a public-opinion drive by pointing out deficiencies in police investigations
Interpreted as aiming, at the last minute, to retain supplementary-investigation authority, among other goals
On November 9 last year, the prosecution flag flies at the Seoul Central District Prosecutors Office building in Seocho-gu, Seoul. Jeong Hyo-jin, reporter
Beginning after the passage last September of the ‘Prosecutors Office Abolition Bill’ and continuing through the end of the year, the prosecution issued a series of announcements publicizing the results of its ‘direct and supplementary investigations’. Materials on investigative outcomes released by district prosecutors offices in the Seoul area contained many expressions intended to emphasize ‘investigative capabilities superior to the police’. With an October crossroads looming over whether to keep or hand over the authority of the prosecution to conduct supplementary investigations into police cases, this is being read as a last-minute campaign to sway public opinion.
The four district prosecutors offices in the Seoul area announced a total of 17 results of direct and supplementary investigations from September 26 last year through year-end. The Western District Office had the most with seven, followed by the Southern with six, and the Eastern and Northern with two each.
Press releases issued by the prosecution included multiple phrases that directly targeted the police. On the 31st of last month, the Southern District Prosecutors Office announced results stating, “After reviewing non-referral records that the police had left unattended for a long time, we clarified the full picture of a drunk-driving case that was on the verge of being buried.” The Southern Office Human Rights Protection Division, after recently receiving the record of a drunk-driving case for which the police had decided on non-referral but had long failed to send, requested that the police reinvestigate. When the police then re-transferred the case to the prosecution with an opinion to indict, the prosecution undertook a direct supplementary investigation based on evidence including CCTV footage and said that on the 30th of last month it indicted the suspect without detention on a charge of violating the Road Traffic Act. Through a notice to the media, the Southern Office also explained, “(The police) made a non-referral decision, and for more than three years the case did not come over to the prosecution.”
That same day, the Western District Prosecutors Office also announced a supplementary-investigation case. It said that on the 30th of last month it indicted without detention singer Song Min-ho, who had been suspected of poor attendance during his social service period, and Mr. A, the person in charge of managing the service of Song, on a charge of violating the Military Service Act. The Western Office added, “By conducting a direct supplementary investigation, we uncovered additional unauthorized absences by Mr. Song, beyond the facts transferred by the police, and indicted them together.”
The Seoul Eastern District Prosecutors Office, led by Chief Prosecutor Im Eun-jung, who is known as a representative ‘prosecution reform advocate’, also announced results in the same vein. The Eastern Office ‘Government Joint Investigation Team on Voice Phishing Crime’ said that it supplemented a voice-phishing case transferred by the police last November and indicted four money launderers under detention. The Eastern Office explained that it was “a case in which only low-level voice-phishing cash collectors were transferred without detention by the police,” and that the prosecution conducted a direct supplementary investigation for six months and placed the money launderers under detention.
Investigative significance from a press release on the detention indictment of a tax offender announced by the Seoul Northern District Prosecutors Office on November 18 last year. Provided by the Seoul Northern District Prosecutors Office
The Northern District Prosecutors Office announced that through a direct supplementary investigation last November it uncovered that a national tax delinquent had concealed real-estate sale proceeds through a ‘sham divorce’ (violation of the Punishment of Tax Evaders Act, etc.). The Northern Office said, “This is a matter in which the full scope of the allegations was clarified through a direct supplementary investigation, a typical case showing the need for direct supplementary investigations by the prosecution.”
These successive announcements by the prosecution of supplementary-investigation achievements are analyzed as being mindful of the recent heated ‘debate over retaining the supplementary-investigation authority of the prosecution’. Even within the ruling camp that had pushed ‘dismantling the prosecution’, there has been no small amount of counterargument that abolishing supplementary-investigation authority would be unreasonable due to the difficulty of checking police powers, and with the Ministry of Justice recently publishing a ‘Collection of Outstanding Supplementary Investigations’ and declaring that “supplementary investigations by the prosecution are a bulwark for the protection of human rights,” the prosecution appears to have moved into active publicity. The prosecution has a strong resolve that it will “not let go of supplementary-investigation authority until the very end, for the sake of protecting the human rights of victims.” Although the Prosecutors Office will remove its signboards in October this year due to abolition, with the question of whether to retain supplementary-investigation authority still undecided, the publicity battle of the prosecution is expected to be fierce until the end.
