Seok Dong-hyun "What’s So Great About the Corruption Investigation Office... Expecting Judgment on the Illegality of the Arrest"

"Are the Police Just Hired Hands for Arrest Squads?"
"Acting President Choi Sang-mok Only Makes Ambiguous Remarks"

As an arrest warrant was executed against President Yoon Suk-yeol, his longtime friend of 40 years, lawyer Seok Dong-hyun, came forward to criticize the move.

On the 16th, Lawyer Seok shared a YouTube video link on his social media account, saying, "I noticed a video that explains simply and briefly why it is illegal for the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO) to investigate and arrest a sitting head of state like President Yoon, and how illegal it is. I sincerely hope you watch it." He added, "Even those who do not fully agree with this explanation will feel that it is not just empty words from the investigated party but has substantial reasons behind it. If they cannot even feel that, they have no right to mention the rule of law or to live together in this era and country."

Lawyer Seok Dong-hyun. Seok Dong-hyun Facebook

He continued, "Even after a night has passed, I cannot understand. What kind of great institution is the CIO, and what investigative experience do its staff have to arrest a sitting president while mobilizing 4,700 police officers?" He sharply questioned, "Are the police just hired manpower mobilized only for arrest squads without other duties?" He also criticized, "Why does Acting President Choi Sang-mok not stop this ultra-legal and outrageous act by the National Police Agency but only make ambiguous remarks?" and "Why do the Constitutional Court justices not examine the validity of the warrant or demand the suspension of the arrest execution, even though the CIO and police are arresting the respondent president so outrageously and preventing him from exercising his right to defense, despite the president not fleeing anywhere?"

Additionally, Lawyer Seok continued in a follow-up post, "After President Yoon appeared before the CIO, I mentioned during a Q&A with reporters that we were not considering filing a 'request for review of the arrest warrant'." He stated, "However, the legal team submitted a request for review of the arrest warrant to the Seoul Central District Court in Seocho-dong around 6 p.m. yesterday," and acknowledged, "As a result, I admit that my response was premature."

However, he explained, "Yesterday, while the main lawyers were inside the CIO, I believed that if we were to file a request for review of the arrest warrant, it could only be submitted to the Western District Court, which issued the warrant. I thought it was meaningless to file a review request with the Western District Court, which issued such a flawed warrant twice and dismissed the objections." He added, "Our legal team was preparing a clever strategy to file the request for review of the arrest warrant with the court that has jurisdiction over the Seoul Detention Center, namely the Seoul Central District Court in Seocho-dong." He emphasized, "Regardless of my mistake in the response, I sincerely hope the judges will properly and lawfully judge the illegality of this CIO arrest."