Prosecutors Raid Current and Former Reporters of Kyunghyang and Newsbus... Investigation into 'Presidential Election False Reporting Allegations' Expands to 5 Media Outlets (Comprehensive)

Prosecutors investigating allegations of a series of false reports during the last presidential election phase have uncovered additional circumstances and launched a forced investigation on journalists on the 26th. The investigation, which began with suspicions of NewsTapa's 'Shin Hak-rim-Kim Man-bae false interview' reported three days before the election, is expanding to include news articles from early October 2021, shortly after the election. The number of media outlets targeted by the search warrants has also increased to five.

Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office, Seocho-gu, Seoul. / Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@

The Special Investigation Team of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office (led by Kang Baek-shin, Head of the Anti-Corruption Investigation Division 1) sent prosecutors and investigators to the residences of two current and former reporters of Kyunghyang Shinmun this morning to secure reporting materials on charges of defamation under the Information and Communications Network Act. The residence of a former reporter of the online media NewsBus was also included in the search targets.

They are suspected of making false reports alleging that President Yoon Seok-yeol, who was a leading candidate of the People Power Party around October 2021 when the Daejang-dong scandal intensified, had covered up the case of Jo Woo-hyung, a loan broker for Daejang-dong, while investigating the 2011 Busan Savings Bank case.

At the time, Kyunghyang Shinmun repeatedly covered allegations of President Yoon's inadequate investigation. In the October 7, 2021 article, it was reported that Jo, anticipating an investigation by the Supreme Prosecutors' Office's Central Investigation Department, had hired former special prosecutor Park Young-soo as his lawyer through an introduction by Kim Man-bae, and that Jo, who received a bribe of about 1 billion KRW in exchange for the Daejang-dong project financing (PF) loan, had avoided indictment at that time but was prosecuted and sentenced to prison in the 2015 prosecution. It also pointed out that the Central Investigation Department did not handle the Daejang-dong PF loan case even during the large-scale investigation of Busan Savings Bank. The fact that President Yoon was the lead prosecutor in the Busan Savings Bank investigation was also mentioned for the first time.

On October 21 of the same year, based on a phone conversation with Lee Kang-gil, an early developer of Daejang-dong, the article raised suspicions that the Central Investigation Department was aware of Jo's charges but did not verify them. It also suggested the possibility that the contents of Lee's meeting were reported to President Yoon, who was the lead prosecutor at the time. On October 26, 2021, it was also reported that the Central Investigation Department conducted a comprehensive account tracing on Jo but did not even indict him.

NewsBus, in its October 21, 2021 article, reported suspicions that the Central Investigation Department had conducted account tracing on Jo and his associates based on Jo's statements in police investigation records and interviews with Lee but did not indict him.

After analyzing the materials secured today, prosecutors are expected to summon the reporters to verify whether there was any 'behind-the-scenes' involvement during the reporting process.

Until now, the prosecution's investigation had focused on suspicions related to NewsTapa's false interview with Kim Man-bae and Shin Hak-rim conducted in February-March last year just before the presidential election, JTBC's report on Yoon Seok-yeol's coffee, and the online media Report Act's false recording report on Choi Jae-kyung. However, the recent trend has changed. With the investigation expanding to include reports from October 2021, there is speculation in legal circles that it could extend comprehensively to the Democratic Party's presidential campaign.