A call to lose — season two

Choi Hyeon-chul
 
The creator is a nationwide information editor on the JoongAng Ilbo. 
 
 
 
In December 2020, former President Yoon Suk Yeol, then the prosecutor common, was suspended for 2 months over allegations of the unlawful surveillance of judges, interference in investigations together with the “Channel A” case, and undermining political neutrality. Yoon filed a lawsuit to overturn the disciplinary motion and requested an injunction. Eight days later, the court docket accepted the injunction, permitting him to return to his put up. Three months later, he resigned and entered politics. However in October 2021, forward of the Folks Energy Get together’s presidential major, the Seoul Administrative Courtroom dominated that the disciplinary motion was authentic. Though he had already resigned from the prosecution, the ruling left him with the label of getting violated neutrality and surveilled judges — an untenable burden heading right into a presidential election. He instantly appealed, and through that course of, he received the presidency.
 

Nam Wook, an legal professional indicted over the Daejang-dong growth scandal, arrives on the Seoul Central District Courtroom in Seocho District on Oct. 31 for his first trial verdict. He was sentenced to jail and brought into custody in court docket. [JOINT PRESS CORPS]

 
What adopted sparked controversy. Justice Minister Han Dong-hoon dismissed all authorities attorneys who had efficiently defended the disciplinary motion within the first trial. The brand new attorneys from the Authorities Authorized Service didn’t name witnesses or actively argue the case, exhibiting little intent to win. Because of this, the federal government misplaced on attraction and didn’t file for a remaining Supreme Courtroom assessment.
 
The Democratic Get together (DP), then in opposition, fiercely criticized the result. They mocked Han by calling it “Choice to Lose,” a play on the movie “Choice to Depart” (2022). Former Justice Minister Choo Mi-ae, who led the disciplinary course of, warned, “The general public just isn’t blind. Political theater is not going to work.”
 
 
Now the DP finds itself in a reversed place. After prosecutors determined final weekend to not attraction the Daejang-dong corruption case for 5 key defendants, criticism erupted. The occasion is insisting it was not an “abandonment of attraction,” however somewhat “restraint from interesting.” They argue that the sentences already exceeded one-third of the prosecution’s suggestions — one of many inner standards for attraction. However the court docket acknowledged guilt whereas ruling it was troublesome to find out the precise quantity of economic loss, making use of breach of belief below the Felony Act as a substitute of the extra severe aggravated breach of belief below the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Particular Financial Crimes. For the reason that major defendant was acquitted of aggravated breach of belief, prosecutors at the moment are in a weaker place to argue that the coconspirators must be convicted of it. Whereas the ruling occasion warns that abolishing the crime of breach of belief would remove prosecutions altogether, the choice has successfully preempted controversy. What is evident is that President Lee Jae Myung, whose personal trial within the case has been suspended, advantages from the prosecution’s determination. Furthermore, the chance to get well a lot of the 489.5 billion received ($336 million) in alleged damages is now gone, apart from the 47.3 billion received ordered to be confiscated as bribe-related funds.
 
To be truthful, the prosecution’s longstanding apply of interesting each acquittal has been extensively criticized. Even in human rights circumstances, prosecutors would robotically attraction regardless of acquittals in retrials or suggestions from fact commissions — with out accountability as soon as remaining innocence was confirmed. President Lee referred to as this a “merciless apply in opposition to the individuals” throughout a Cupboard assembly in late September and ordered reforms. The Justice Ministry responded that it will change the principles, and Justice Minister Jung Sung-ho pledged to revise inner pointers to curb mechanical appeals.
 

Yoon Suk Yeol, then prosecutor common, arrives on the Supreme Prosecutors’ Workplace in Seocho District, southern Seoul, on Dec. 14, 2020, a day earlier than the second disciplinary committee listening to. He was suspended for 2 months however received a court docket injunction eight days later that allowed him to return to obligation. [NEWSIS]

 
A month later, on Nov. 4, the Supreme Prosecutors’ Workplace introduced it will not attraction the acquittal of a father and daughter wrongfully convicted within the notorious “cyanide makgeolli [Korean rice wine] homicide case.” Investigators and prosecutors on the retrial workforce had wished to attraction, however senior officers stopped them. For a second, it appeared the prosecution was actually altering.
 
However public sentiment shifted once more when President Lee grew to become the second beneficiary of this new restraint. Some now ponder whether the makgeolli case was merely setting the stage for the “major occasion” — the Daejang-dong scandal. Critics ask how totally different that is from when the earlier administration was accused of constructing a “determination to lose” to erase a robust determine’s disciplinary document.