A fact-finding team under the Justice Ministry's Committee on Human Rights and the Future of the Prosecution reports its first findings on the 15th. The inquiry covers allegations of what the ruling bloc has called "fabricated indictments," as well as whether any unlawful conduct occurred during investigations into cases involving President Lee Jae-myung — leading some to say the findings could result in a recommendation to withdraw charges.
According to legal sources, the team will report findings on some of the seven cases selected for the first round of its inquiry at a committee meeting held that day. The report comes about four months after the committee was launched in June to examine allegations of human rights violations and abuse of authority in the exercise of prosecutorial power.
Among the cases expected to be reported first are the manipulation of housing statistics and the shooting death of a government official in the West Sea. Records related to the housing statistics case were obtained relatively smoothly from the early stage of the inquiry, according to those familiar with the matter. The West Sea shooting case also involves fewer contested points and a smaller volume of records than the other cases, these people said. The Wirye new town development corruption case, in which Lee was indicted, has also been partly examined and is included in the report, according to these sources.
Last month, the team sent written questions to each of the investigative teams that had handled the cases, asking about how the investigations were conducted and what procedures were followed. The questions asked whether human rights were violated during the investigations and what internal discussions took place in reaching the conclusions.
The key issue is whether concrete evidence has been secured to support claims of unlawful investigation, such as fabrication of evidence or the coaxing or intimidation of people connected to the cases. Mere procedural shortcomings and serious unlawful conduct grave enough to undermine the legitimacy of an indictment carry different implications for follow-up action. The direction of the committee's recommendation is expected to hinge on the team's findings of fact and its assessment of whether laws were broken.
If the committee concludes that serious unlawful conduct occurred in the indictment process, it could recommend a formal investigation or the withdrawal of charges. Attention is also turning to the possibility of charges being withdrawn through the Public Prosecution Office rather than a special counsel, particularly after Lee asked at a press conference on the 18th of last month that lawmakers pass a bill on a special counsel for fabricated indictments after deleting its provision on withdrawing charges. The committee's recommendations carry no legal force, however, so any actual withdrawal of charges would have to be decided separately by the Public Prosecution Office.
One person in legal circles said: "I understand that committee members are firmly convinced there were problems with some of the cases under review. There is concern that they may be defining even partial shortcomings in the investigative process as 'unlawful investigation' to build a case for withdrawing charges."
A recommendation by the committee to withdraw charges or open a formal investigation in the Wirye case in particular is expected to affect the inquiries into other cases involving Lee. Of the 19 cases targeted by the committee's inquiry, eight are linked directly or indirectly to Lee, including the Wirye, Daejang-dong and Baekhyeon-dong development corruption cases, the Ssangbangwool remittance to North Korea, illegal sponsorship of Seongnam FC and the misuse of Gyeonggi Province corporate credit cards. Six of those have yet to receive a first-instance ruling, raising the prospect that charges could be withdrawn.
The selection of a new prosecutor general is another variable. With the nomination process for prosecutor general candidates beginning on the 13th, the committee's follow-up recommendations are increasingly likely to coincide with the appointment of a new chief. Lee Jung-hyun, deputy head of the Public Prosecution Office and acting prosecutor general, said on the 23rd of last month, when asked about the possibility of charges against Lee being withdrawn, that "the fact-finding team's inquiry is under way, so we will need to look at the results."
Resistance within the prosecution service persists. Kim Seong-dong, head of the inspection bureau overseeing internal audits at the Public Prosecution Office, recently wrote on the internal network iPros that "a serious threat to the independence of prosecutors' duties is still proceeding in the form of 'the composition and activities of the fact-finding team.'" He added that "if measures are taken against cases still on trial based on the unlawful composition and activities of the fact-finding team, that would be a grave danger and threat to the constitutional system of prosecutors."