"Not Allowed Even If Gifted!" Nine Current and Former Public Officials Prosecuted for Receiving Gifts from Haeundae LCT Developer Chairman

Busan District Prosecutors' Office to Reflect Citizen Committee's Conclusion on Citizen Group's Accusation

Busan Haeundae LCT. [Photo by Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Yong-woo] Nine current and former public officials of Busan city have been collectively brought to trial on charges of receiving holiday gifts from Lee Young-bok, chairman of LCT PFV, the developer of Haeundae LCT in Busan.

According to the Busan District Prosecutors' Office on the 27th, the Anti-Corruption and Strong Investigation Division indicted nine current and former public officials without detention on the 20th on charges of receiving gifts from Chairman Lee Young-bok in a case reported by a civic group related to the 'LCT holiday gifts.' The other eight received a suspension of prosecution.

The nine indicted are accused of receiving gifts worth about 300,000 KRW from Chairman Lee five to twelve times during holidays such as Chuseok and Lunar New Year from September 2010 to February 2016, totaling between 1.5 million and 3.6 million KRW.

Among these nine is a current level 2 public official of the city. The official requested to be suspended from duty immediately after being notified of the indictment on the 26th, and it is known that Mayor Park Hyung-joon accepted this request.

The prosecution of these public officials was initially a non-prosecution case. The prosecutors who investigated the LCT corruption case four to five years ago did not indict them because the value of the gifts received was not large, and instead notified the relevant institutions of the list so that disciplinary actions could be taken.

The Busan Participation and Autonomy Solidarity opposed this and filed charges against the public officials for bribery in March 2017.

The prosecution recently summoned the officials again for investigation and decided to indict nine of them.

The prosecution stated, "Although we confirmed charges against 17 current and former public officials who received holiday gifts, none met the prosecution's criteria for indictment. After submitting the case to the Prosecutors' Citizen Committee for review on the 1st, the conclusion was to indict nine without detention, which was reflected in the decision."