Seoul Central District Court Upholds Son Jun-sung's Quasi-Appeal in Remand Trial
Rules Part of the High-ranking Officials' Crime Investigation Agency's Search and Seizure Was Illegal
Supreme Court Previously Recognized Illegality in Evidence Collection Methods
The court has ruled that the High-ranking Officials' Crime Investigation Agency's search and seizure of Prosecutor General Son Jun-sung, who was acquitted in the appeal trial over the 'gobal saju' (alleged report solicitation) suspicion, was partially illegal.
On the 11th, Judge So Jun-seop of the Seoul Central District Court Criminal Division 32 made a decision to accept the petition in the remand trial of the quasi-appeal case regarding the search and seizure order filed by Prosecutor Son. This was in response to the decision made in January 2023 to re-examine whether the search and seizure by the High-ranking Officials' Crime Investigation Agency was lawful.
The agency conducted searches and seizures at Prosecutor Son's residence and office from September to November 2021 to investigate the alleged report solicitation case. At that time, the agency secured notes, emails, messenger records from the prosecution's internal network (Eproseu), and search history from the Criminal Justice Information System (KIX) used by Prosecutor Son.
Prosecutor Son's side filed a quasi-appeal, arguing that the agency did not follow the procedure of notifying the suspect's participation and that the search and seizure were conducted excluding him. Initially, the Seoul Central District Court dismissed the quasi-appeal in July 2022, but the Supreme Court accepted Prosecutor Son's claim in January 2023 and overturned the original ruling. The case was then returned to the Seoul Central District Court.
The Supreme Court held that when the investigative agency conducting the search and seizure and the agency expected in the quasi-appeal do not match, the court should have gone through a procedure requesting Prosecutor Son to correct the purpose and thoroughly examined whether the search and seizure order was illegal.
However, the Supreme Court maintained the original court's ruling that dismissed the quasi-appeal, stating that prior notification and the right to participate were unnecessary for the seizure of Prosecutor Son's PC storage device, and thus there was no problem.
Previously, Prosecutor Son was acquitted in the second trial of the alleged report solicitation case. The second trial court accepted Prosecutor Son's claim that the evidence collected through the agency's seizure of Eproseu and KIX was illegally obtained and did not recognize its evidentiary value.
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