Voice Phishing Suspect, Forced Summoned from the Philippines After 8 Years

Fled During Trial but Caught After Undercover Investigation

On the 6th, ahead of the prosecution review committee regarding the luxury handbag receipt case involving First Lady Kim Keon-hee, wife of President Yoon Seok-yeol, staff members are moving at the Supreme Prosecutors' Office in Seocho-gu, Seoul. Photo by Kang Jin-hyung aymsdream@

A defendant who fled to the Philippines while on trial for a voice phishing case was captured after 8 years on the run and forcibly repatriated to South Korea on the 6th.

The Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office announced that they apprehended Lee Mo (38), a former member of a violent crime organization and a voice phishing criminal, in the Philippines and repatriated him to South Korea on the same day.

According to the prosecution, Lee was indicted and tried on charges of fraud and others for embezzling 400 million won from victims in 26 instances while working as a counselor at a voice phishing call center in Dalian, China, from 2013 to 2014.

In May 2016, just before sentencing, he fled to the Philippines to avoid punishment. The Seoul Central District Court sentenced Lee to three years in prison in February 2017, and the sentence was finalized. Subsequently, the prosecution requested international cooperation and a warrant through Interpol, and from June to July this year, a prosecutor investigator dispatched to the Philippines began tracking Lee.

The investigator shared Lee's information in real-time with relevant Philippine agencies while conducting inquiries into his residence and tracking his social networking service (SNS) activity, discovering that Lee had established a family with a Filipino spouse and was living a luxurious life running a high-end car sales business.

Later, in cooperation with the Philippines National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and the Philippines Immigration Bureau's Fugitive Search Unit (FSU), they conducted a stakeout operation attempting a disguised vehicle transaction and finally arrested Lee on July 11.