Yongsan District Mayor Park Hee-young Explains "No Attempt to Destroy Evidence"

Yongsan-gu Issues Clarification on the Afternoon of the 15th: "Park Hee-young, Yongsan-gu Mayor, Denies Attempting Evidence Tampering
Will Continue to Fully Cooperate with Police Investigation"

[Asia Economy Reporter Jong-il Park] Yongsan-gu (District Mayor Hee-young Park) issued a clarification statement on the afternoon of the 15th, stating, "Hee-young Park, Mayor of Yongsan-gu, did not attempt to destroy evidence and will continue to actively cooperate with the police investigation."

The district clarified this in response to reports by multiple media outlets that the Special Investigation Headquarters of the National Police Agency, investigating the Itaewon disaster, mentioned during a press briefing on the 15th that some suspects affiliated with Yongsan-gu Office, including Mayor Hee-young Park, changed or lost their mobile phones after the disaster, suggesting an attempt to destroy evidence by Park changing his phone immediately after the disaster.

In particular, it was reported that Mayor Park switched his mobile phone from the Samsung Galaxy he originally used to an Apple iPhone on the 5th of last month, just one week after the disaster, and only provided the password for the new phone to the investigation team at the end of last month.

Regarding this, Mayor Park stated that he submitted not only the newly purchased iPhone but also the previously used Galaxy phone and his work phone to the police.

He added that during the seizure, he provided the pattern password for the Galaxy phone and, in the case of the iPhone, followed his lawyer’s advice to allow the password to be disclosed during forensic analysis.

The police requested the password during the forensic process of the iPhone on November 25th, and Mayor Hee-young Park claims he immediately provided the password upon the police’s request.

The police have completed forensic analysis on all seized mobile phones and refuted the claim that Mayor Hee-young Park attempted to destroy evidence as groundless.