<기사>Legal Affairs Vice Minister Lee Yong-gu Grabs Taxi Driver's Collar While Drunk... Police Close Internal Investigation

[Asia Economy Reporter Baek Kyunghwan] It was recently revealed that Lee Yong-gu, Deputy Minister of Justice, assaulted a taxi driver while intoxicated last month. At the time, Deputy Minister Lee was a lawyer.

According to legal circles on the 19th, Deputy Minister Lee grabbed the collar of a taxi driver late at night in an apartment in Seocho-gu earlier last month.

The taxi driver, who arrived at the apartment, reportedly grabbed the back of Deputy Minister Lee’s neck while waking him up from sleeping inside the car intoxicated. The police, who responded to a 112 emergency call, confirmed Deputy Minister Lee’s identity and decided to investigate later before letting him go.

However, since the taxi driver later expressed that he did not wish to press charges, the police decided not to file criminal charges against Deputy Minister Lee and closed the case as a simple assault under the principle of non-prosecution upon victim’s withdrawal.

The police judged that the situation did not fall under "while operating a vehicle" as defined by the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Economic Crimes (Special Act). The Special Act stipulates that assault against a driver operating a vehicle can be punished even if the victim does not wish to press charges.

The police reportedly stated that there was a 2017 Constitutional Court ruling that "parking or stopping a car without continuous intention to operate it in a place where there is no risk of disturbing public traffic safety and order is not considered driving," and based on this, the case was closed without further investigation.

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