Courts nationwide have entered a two-week recess period.
According to the legal community on the 25th, most courts across the country, including the Seoul Central District Court and the Seoul High Court, which are the largest in scale nationwide, will enter a recess period from today until the 5th of next month.
The recess system, which suspends trials for a certain period during the heatwave or vacation periods so that trial-related personnel and litigants can rest, was introduced in 2006 to resolve the issue where different courts and trial divisions have different rest periods, causing parties involved in cases to be unable to take vacations on time.
During the recess, non-urgent trials such as ordinary civil, family, and administrative case hearings, preparatory hearings, mediation and reconciliation hearings, non-custodial criminal trial hearings, and trials that do not significantly affect human rights are not held. However, trials may proceed if the court deems it necessary.
However, cases that require prompt handling, such as provisional seizure and injunction hearings, suspension of execution, criminal trials of detained defendants, pre-arrest suspect hearings (warrant substantive examination), and detention review hearings, will be held during this period.
At the Seoul Central District Court, the trials related to the Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung's 'Daejang-dong, Wirye, Seongnam FC, Baekhyeon-dong suspicions,' which were scheduled weekly, will also be temporarily paused.
The trial for Lee, held once every two weeks, concerning allegations of false statements related to the late Kim Moon-gi, head of Development Division 1 at Seongnam Urban Development Corporation, and false statements related to the Baekhyeon-dong project, violating the Public Official Election Act, has also been rescheduled to after the recess period.
The trial for breach of trust charges against Kim Man-bae, major shareholder of Hwacheon Daeyu Asset Management, former Seongnam Urban Development Corporation director Yoo Dong-gyu, and lawyer Nam Wook, which is considered the 'mainstream' trial of the Daejang-dong incident, has also been scheduled after the recess period.
The case involving former special prosecutor Park Young-soo's 'Daejang-dong 5 billion Club suspicions' will also resume after the recess period.
After the recess ends, important trials will resume next month.
In particular, on the 26th of next month, the first trial sentencing hearing for former Supreme Court Chief Justice Yang Sung-tae (75, Judicial Research and Training Institute Class 2), who was indicted on charges related to the 'judicial scandal,' is scheduled.
This will be 4 years and 10 months since his indictment on February 11, 2019. The closing arguments for former Chief Justice Yang were held on September 15, after 1,677 days since the indictment. Including preparatory hearings, a total of 290 trials were held. The prosecution has requested a 7-year prison sentence for former Chief Justice Yang.
The sentencing hearing for Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong, who is on trial for charges related to 'Samsung's unfair merger and accounting fraud,' will also be held on the same day. Lee's trial, which began with his indictment in September 2020, has proceeded through 106 sessions over 3 years and 2 months.
At the closing arguments held on November 17 last month, the prosecution requested a 5-year prison sentence and a fine of 500 million won for Lee.
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