Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon, who received a lower-court sentence that would have stripped him of office over allegations that an associate covered his opinion-poll costs, was acquitted on appeal. The decisive factor in overturning the conviction was the credibility of testimony by Myung Tae-kyun, a political broker. The appeals court found Myung's account difficult to accept at face value and the supporting evidence insufficient. The court also stressed a basic principle of criminal trials: even where circumstances raise suspicion of guilt, a defendant must be given the benefit of the doubt if the charges are not sufficiently proven.
The Seoul High Court's 7th Criminal Division, presided over by Ku Hoe-keun, on the 23rd vacated all guilty findings from the first trial and acquitted Oh, former Seoul Vice Mayor for Political Affairs Kang Chul-won, and businessman Kim Han-jung, known as a supporter of Oh, who had been indicted on charges of violating the Political Funds Act. The lower court had sentenced Oh to a fine of 10 million won and forfeiture of 21 million won, a penalty that would have cost him the mayoralty.
Oh was sent to trial on charges that he commissioned 10 opinion polls from Myung ahead of the April 7, 2021, Seoul mayoral by-election and had Kim cover 33 million won in survey costs on his behalf. The lower court found him guilty on some of the counts involving payment of polling costs by another party. The appeals court, however, concluded that the charges had not been sufficiently proven.
The appeals court found fault with the lower court's approach of selecting only portions of Myung's testimony and treating them as credible. "There are circumstances in which it is difficult to clearly separate what Myung directly experienced from what he described in exaggerated terms," the court said. It also found that Myung tended to deflect matters unfavorable to himself with peripheral explanations or to reinterpret earlier statements in his own favor. Remarks by Myung after Oh announced he would file a complaint — to the effect of "watch how I tie Oh Se-hoon to this" — also weighed against the credibility of his testimony.
The appeals court accepted that Oh and Kang met Myung several times, that they received some of the polling results, and that Kim paid the survey costs. But it held that these circumstances alone were not enough to conclude that Oh commissioned the polls and directed someone else to pay for them.
Myung claimed that Oh called him in tears, saying he needed a poll showing him beating rival candidate Na Kyung-won. The court found it "defies common sense" that Oh would have commissioned polls — and gone so far as to raise illegal payment arrangements — just two days after meeting Myung.
A transcript of a phone call between Myung and the businessman Kim, submitted during the appeal, also figured in the assessment of his credibility. Myung told Kim: "Oh Se-hoon doesn't know. He doesn't know, so don't worry. I'll take care of it." The court noted that Myung's claim that Oh commissioned the polls was inconsistent with the transcript. It did not rule out the possibility that Myung conducted the polls on his own initiative to show off his influence.
The allegation that Oh asked Kim to cover the polling costs was also rejected. The lower court had inferred that Oh must have given instructions because the money was transferred before Kim and Myung had built a personal relationship. The appeals court, however, found it hard to accept the claim that Oh would have openly requested an illegal payment arrangement at the cost of political risk. It also noted that Kim sent the money by bank transfer, an unusual method for an illicit transaction.
"It is not the case that there are no circumstances raising suspicion of guilt, given that it has been objectively established that some polling results were shared after Oh Se-hoon and Kang Chul-won met Myung Tae-kyun several times and that the supporter Kim Han-jung paid the money," the appeals court said. "But it is difficult to attach credibility to Myung Tae-kyun's testimony, which is effectively the sole key piece of evidence, and fragmentary facts alone are not enough to establish the charges in this case."
Shortly after the acquittal, Oh said he would "work even harder to repay citizens and live up to their trust." The special counsel team led by Min Joong-ki objected to the ruling and said it would appeal. "This is a deeply disappointing ruling," said Park No-soo, a deputy special counsel on the team. "We will correct it through an appeal to the Supreme Court." Park added: "We are well aware that parts of Myung Tae-kyun's testimony cannot be believed, but we did not indict based on his testimony alone. We cannot understand how the court assessed the value of other decisive evidence and arrived at this conclusion."
A lawyer and former senior judge, however, offered a different outlook. "The Supreme Court gives maximum deference to findings of fact, so unless there is a legal flaw in how the evidence was assessed, it will not be easy to overturn the ruling," the lawyer said.
Oh had faced a serious blow to his political prospects after the lower court convicted him of violating the Political Funds Act, but the acquittal on appeal brings him relief. Under Article 57 of the Political Funds Act, anyone fined 1 million won or more for the illegal receipt of political funds is barred from taking or being appointed to public office for five years after the sentence becomes final. Those already in office or appointed must step down. Had the 10 million won fine from the first trial been upheld, Oh would have lost his post and been unable to run in the next presidential election.
The People Power Party, meanwhile, described the acquittal as a case of justice prevailing in the end. In a statement, chief party spokesman Park Choong-kwon said: "It is more than fortunate — and at the same time only natural — that the Oh Se-hoon administration, entrusted by 10 million Seoul citizens through their votes, can now continue without disruption. The appeals ruling on Mayor Oh is justice taking its proper course."