Former Cheongwadae Special Inspection Team Member Testifies in Court, "More Investigation Needed on Yoo Jae-su's Misconduct"

Former Minister of Justice Cho Kuk, who was indicted on charges of instructing the cover-up of the inspection of Yoo Jae-su, former Deputy Mayor for Economic Affairs of Busan, is responding to reporters' questions as he enters the courtroom for a trial held at the Seoul Central District Court in Seocho-gu, Seoul, on the 5th. Photo by Kang Jin-hyeong aymsdream@

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyung-min] A former Blue House special inspection team member testified in the trial regarding former Minister of Justice Cho Kuk's 'alleged cover-up of inspection' that "the misconduct of former Busan Deputy Mayor Yoo Jae-soo should have been further investigated."

Kim, who worked as a special inspection team member at the Blue House, appeared as a witness on the 5th at the Seoul Central District Court Criminal Division 21 (Presiding Judge Kim Mi-ri) during the trial of former Minister Cho and others, and made this statement.

Kim served as the senior 'desk' of the special inspection team during the inspection of former Deputy Mayor Yoo Jae-soo at the end of 2017.

Regarding former Minister Cho's December 2018 response at the National Assembly's Steering Committee that "the basis for the intelligence on Yoo Jae-soo's misconduct was weak," Kim countered, "We believed more investigation was necessary."

At the time of the inspection, former Deputy Mayor Yoo suddenly took sick leave and went into hiding, refusing to cooperate with the investigation.

Lee In-geol, then head of the special inspection team, reported this to superiors, after which Kim testified that he was told, "Since the higher-ups said to stop the inspection, cease the investigation."

Kim said, "I realized Yoo Jae-soo had very strong 'backing' (baek)," and added, "While the person in question took sick leave and disappeared, being told from above to stop was absurd."

He also criticized the fact that Baek Won-woo, then Senior Secretary for Civil Affairs, contacted the Vice Chairman of the Financial Services Commission to inform him, "There was an inspection of Yoo Jae-soo, but most issues were cleared, so please consider this in personnel matters," saying, "I don't understand this."

Kim said, "Why would the Senior Secretary for Civil Affairs, who is not in the chain of command, notify the results of the special inspection team? And how could they notify inspection results when the investigation was not even concluded?"

Meanwhile, on the same day, the prosecution revealed that they are also considering preliminarily applying charges of dereliction of duty against former Minister Cho, in addition to abuse of authority and obstruction of rights.

Former Minister Cho has argued that since he could not proceed with further inspections permitted by law, exercising decision-making authority as Senior Secretary for Civil Affairs to terminate the inspection was neither an abuse of authority nor obstruction of the special inspection team members' rights, and thus he is not guilty.

He contends that if no crime is recognized for actively exceeding his authority, then it would be inconsistent to accuse him of a crime for passively failing to perform required duties.

In response, Cho's defense attorney rebutted, "Dereliction of duty cannot be applied from the outset," and said, "The defense depends on how the prosecution files charges; it is unusual in criminal procedure for the prosecution to change the indictment based on our defense."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.