Active Prosecutor: "Ministry of Justice Organizational Reform Plan Lacks Philosophical Consideration"

Ministry of Justice Conducts Opinion Survey on Organizational Restructuring... Plans to Strengthen and Expand Trial Division Functions

[Asia Economy Reporter Bae Kyunghwan] As the Ministry of Justice proposed an organizational reform plan that significantly reduces the direct investigation departments and strengthens the criminal and trial divisions, voices from the field have continued to criticize it as a "reform plan that does not reflect reality."

According to the legal community on the 12th, Daegu District Prosecutor Cha Hodong (41, Judicial Research and Training Institute class 38) pointed out on the night of the 11th on the prosecution's internal network 'Eprose' that the Ministry of Justice's organizational reform plan for the trial sector was "a reform plan created without any research or philosophical consideration."

The Ministry of Justice delivered the reform plan to the Supreme Prosecutors' Office the day before, which abolishes four major positions within the Supreme Prosecutors' Office held by mid-level executives equivalent to deputy prosecutors at frontline prosecution offices, while reestablishing the criminal division's work system and strengthening and expanding the trial division's functions, and requested opinions.

Prosecutor Cha criticized the part where the Ministry of Justice mentioned the need to transfer criminal division work as it plans to promote the 'one trial division, one prosecutor, one investigator system,' even though the current workload of the trial prosecutors' office does not reach that of the criminal division.

He said, "On what empirical data is the claim based that the workload of the trial prosecutors' office does not reach that of the criminal division?" and added, "I want to know what philosophical consideration produced the opinion that since the trial prosecutors have less work than the criminal division, it should be supplemented with criminal division work."

He continued, "If criminal division personnel are transferred, the workload of trial prosecutors, which is already less than that of the criminal division, will decrease further, so the idea of simply supplementing with criminal investigations is a fragment of endlessly shallow thinking." He also argued, "The one prosecutor, one trial division system should not start from simply reducing the two trial divisions handled by one prosecutor to one," claiming that the reform plan lacks consideration of the need to assign specialized trial prosecutors or the changed circumstances such as restrictions on the evidentiary power of prosecution records.

He also raised issues regarding the plan to reorganize the criminal division prosecutor's office into a 'trial preparation-type prosecutor's office' focused on determining the presence or absence of charges and preparing evidence for trials. Prosecutor Cha stated, "For the establishment of the investigator testimony system, deep understanding among the police, prosecution, and courts is necessary, and it is a system that cannot be introduced immediately through organizational reform," and argued, "The introduction of the trial preparation-type prosecutor's office and fundamental changes in the trial environment should be discussed over the medium to long term."

Regarding the plan to bifurcate the trial division into a trial and prosecution division composed of senior prosecutors at the high prosecutor level (single trial prosecutor's office) or a mix of highly experienced prosecutors and low-seniority prosecutors among regular prosecutors, he said, "It should start with reviewing whether low-seniority prosecutors are perceived as an undesirable position prioritized for assignment to the trial division."

Meanwhile, Cha's post received over 50 supportive comments such as "I deeply agree," "Thank you for the good opinion," and "I agree with the problem raised."

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