‘Kim Man-bae False Interview Tip’ Shin Hak-rim Investigation Accelerates [Kim Man-bae Gate]

Three days before the last presidential election, the prosecution's investigation into the false interview involving Hwacheon Daeyu major shareholder Kim Man-bae and former Press Union chairman Shin Hak-rim, reported by Newstapa, has begun to gain momentum.

Amid claims from the Presidential Office and the ruling party that this case is a mirror image of the 'Kim Dae-up Byungpung (兵風)' incident, which involved false disclosures about the military service of Lee Hoi-chang, the Grand National Party candidate's son during the 2002 presidential election, attention is focused on how far the prosecution's investigation will expand.

Shin Hak-rim, former chairman of the Korean Federation of Mediaworkers' Unions.

On the morning of the 6th, the Anti-Corruption Investigation Division 3 of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office (Chief Prosecutor Kang Baek-shin) conducted a search and seizure of Kim's residence and office in connection with the 165 million won paid by Kim to Shin as compensation for the false interview. This came five days after a search and seizure of Shin's residence, who is under suspicion of embezzlement and violation of the Anti-Graft Act, on the 1st.

Earlier, the prosecution requested Shin to appear for questioning on the same day. However, it is known that Shin conveyed the intention to appear next week due to health reasons the day before, so as of the morning of the 6th, his attendance was uncertain.

On September 15, 2021, Kim met with Shin and gave an interview claiming that "When President Yoon Seok-yeol was the head of the Central Investigation Division 2 at the Supreme Prosecutors' Office in 2011, he met Jo Woo-hyung, a broker for Daejang-dong loans in the Busan Savings Bank case, and the prosecutor in charge was made to serve coffee, leading to the case being dismissed." The recorded interview was reported by Newstapa, where Shin was an advisory member, three days before the presidential election on March 6 of last year.

Following Newstapa's report, newspapers such as Kyunghyang Shinmun, Hankyoreh, and OhmyNews began citing the report one after another, followed by subsequent coverage by MBC, KBS, JTBC, and others. At the time, Lee Jae-myung, the ruling party's presidential candidate, posted Newstapa's report on his SNS and questioned President Yoon during a TV debate, asking, "Why did you serve coffee to Mr. Jo?"

The prosecution believes that in September 2021, Shin received 165 million won from Kim after giving a false interview claiming that Kim and then People Power Party candidate Yoon Seok-yeol had dismissed the Busan Savings Bank investigation. This was done with a request to have it reported just before the presidential election. After the allegations surfaced, Shin explained that the 165 million won received from Kim was the price for three copies of his 2020 book titled "The Kinship Map Governing the Republic of Korea," but this explanation is widely regarded as unconvincing.

It is known that the prosecution began investigating Shin's charges while examining Jo Woo-hyung, the actual owner of Cheonhwa-dongin No. 6, and former journalist Bae Mo, the actual owner of Cheonhwa-dongin No. 7. In particular, during the account tracing process related to the Daejang-dong case, it was decisive that a large sum of money was confirmed to have been transferred from Kim's side to Shin's side.

The prosecution's investigation is expected to proceed along three lines: the circumstances of Newstapa's false interview report and similar reports, the quid pro quo relationship regarding the money Shin received from Kim, and the existence of any behind-the-scenes forces behind the false reports.

The first target of the investigation is whether there was any problem in Newstapa's process of reporting Shin's tip-off, who had a relationship with the company, without special verification procedures just before the presidential election. Despite the strong denial of the report's content by the parties involved, such as Mr. Jo mentioned in the interview and President Yoon's side, an investigation is also expected into the media outlets that reported without verification procedures. Responsibility will be determined based on whether they were aware or could have been aware before the report that the interview content was false.

Since the Presidential Office has defined this suspicion as a "rare presidential election manipulation" and stated that the media outlets quoting the interview played the role of "a large speaker for a planned political operation," the prosecution's investigation is expected to proceed intensively.

It is widely expected that there will be little difficulty in proving the crimes of breach of trust and violation of the Anti-Graft Act by Kim and Shin, who exchanged an excessively large amount of money under the pretext of "book payment."

It is also of interest whether the prosecution investigation will reveal any behind-the-scenes forces behind Newstapa's report. In political and legal circles, even if not Lee Jae-myung himself, if any connection between members of Lee's campaign or Democratic Party officials during the presidential election and Kim or Newstapa is revealed, the impact of this case is expected to grow uncontrollably. A current prosecutor said, "There is a reasonable suspicion," adding, "Prosecutorial verification is inevitable even for the sake of uncovering the truth."