Supreme Court Confirms 5-Year Prison Sentence for Yang Jin-ho for Abuse of Power and Bizarre Acts

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[Asia Economy Reporter Baek Kyunghwan] Yang Jin-ho, former chairman of Korea Future Technology, who was prosecuted for abusing employees with violent and bizarre acts, has been finally sentenced to five years in prison by the Supreme Court. Yang was sentenced to seven years in the first trial and five years in the appellate trial.

On the 15th, the Supreme Court's First Division (Presiding Justice Lee Heung-gu) upheld the appellate court's ruling sentencing Yang, who was detained and prosecuted on charges including violation of the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes (joint injury) and the Animal Protection Act, to five years in prison.

Yang was charged with forcibly giving an unidentified pill to a company employee in April 2013 and forcing employees to eat raw garlic at a company workshop in June 2015. He also forced employees to eat hot sauce and dye their hair against their will.

He was also accused of animal cruelty, such as brutally striking live chickens with a Japanese sword and shooting chickens with arrows. Additionally, he is charged with detaining and assaulting a university professor whom he suspected of having an affair with his wife. He was also prosecuted for installing a program on the company messenger that secretly monitored employees' mobile phone text messages.

In the first trial, Yang was sentenced to seven years in prison. The court sentenced him to five years for offenses committed before the final judgment in December 2013 (1 year and 6 months imprisonment with 3 years probation for copyright law violation, etc.) and two years for offenses committed afterward.

However, the appellate court reduced Yang's sentence to five years. While the appellate court recognized most of Yang's charges, it dismissed the prosecution's special rape charge due to insufficient evidence. The court stated regarding the special rape charge, "It is somewhat difficult to accept without reasonable doubt the fact that the victim was assaulted with the victim's mobile phone and a broken sofa leg," and "Since the victim did not file a complaint against Yang at the time, the crime requiring a complaint does not apply."

On this day, the Supreme Court also accepted the facts and legal judgments of the lower court and dismissed Yang's appeal.

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