Government Official Illegally Changing Construction Equipment Use Sentenced to Prison in Appeal Trial

Officials who illegally changed the use of construction machinery subject to supply control or leaked owners' personal information at the request of dealers were sentenced to prison in the appellate court as well.

While a public official whose statute of limitations for dereliction of duty was recognized received a partial sentence reduction, another junior official who was acquitted in the first trial was also given a suspended prison sentence.

The Criminal Division 4 of Gwangju District Court (Chief Judge Jeong Yeong-ha) announced on the 1st that in the appellate trial of four people including A (54), a 7th-grade public official of Suncheon-si, Jeollanam-do, who was indicted for dereliction of duty and other charges, the appellate court overturned the first trial’s suspended sentence of 1 year imprisonment with a 2-year probation and sentenced him to 10 months imprisonment with 2 years probation.

Another public official B (60), who was acquitted in the first trial, was also given a 6-month prison sentence suspended for 2 years.

According to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, since 2009, to control the supply of construction machinery, the new registration of certain commercial construction machinery such as dump trucks and concrete mixer trucks has been restricted. However, registration changes are only allowed in some exceptional cases where business rights are maintained when replacing already registered construction machinery.

Officials A and B were indicted on charges of changing the use of private construction machinery to commercial use without business rights and leaking registration records containing personal information of construction machinery owners at the request of dealers from 2015 to 2018.

The appellate court acknowledged that A committed dereliction of duty by changing the use of construction machinery without grounds while handling construction machinery registration in the city’s transportation administration department, but found the original judgment illegal as some charges were time-barred or unproven.

Since A’s dereliction of duty statute of limitations (5 years) started from January 2017 when he stopped handling construction machinery registration due to a job transfer, the statute of limitations had already expired by the indictment date in May 2022.

However, the appellate court ruled differently on B, who was acquitted in the first trial. B neglected his duty by rejecting applications because the deletion confirmation or construction machinery registration ledger was not attached, and the appellate court found him guilty for failing to verify the deletion date of the business rights and process the transfer registration accordingly.