"Decided not to refer prosecutor misconduct cases to the Corruption Investigation Office if non-prosecution is determined"

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyung-min] It has been confirmed that the Supreme Prosecutors' Office has established an internal policy not to refer cases to the High-ranking Officials' Crime Investigation Division (HCID) if, after investigating prosecutor misconduct cases, it determines that the matter is not serious enough to prosecute.

According to the Supreme Prosecutors' Office document titled 'Review of High-ranking Officials' Crimes of Prosecutors Subject to Referral to HCID,' submitted to the office of Song Ki-heon, a member of the Democratic Party of Korea, on the 6th, the prosecution has set a policy to close cases within the prosecution if prosecutor misconduct cases are judged to be non-prosecutable.

The document states, "If there is no necessity or value for investigation, or if there is insufficient evidence to prove the charges at the time the investigation is completed, resulting in a decision of no charges or non-prosecution, such cases cannot be considered as those subject to referral to HCID."

Earlier, on the 1st of last month, the Supreme Prosecutors' Office received a request from HCID to submit the entire list of cases related to high-ranking officials' crimes by prosecutors, all non-prosecution decisions, and all record lists. In response, the Supreme Prosecutors' Office refused to submit the materials to HCID and sent a review document along with the reply.

Article 25, Paragraph 2 of the HCID Act stipulates that when the prosecution discovers allegations of high-ranking officials' crimes by prosecutors, the entire case must be referred to HCID; however, the prosecution's interpretation differs.

The Supreme Prosecutors' Office's position is that when allegations of high-ranking officials' crimes by prosecutors are discovered, the case should be referred to HCID according to the HCID Act, but there is no legal basis to submit other materials.

Furthermore, they narrowly interpret "discovery of criminal allegations" as a case where the investigative agency confirms that there is sufficient criminal suspicion to prosecute through investigation.

They argue that at the stage where there are "circumstances suspicious enough to suspect criminal allegations," the prosecution can conduct compulsory investigations, and if a decision of "no charges" or "non-prosecution" is made, it means no criminal allegations were found, so there is no need to refer the case to HCID.

In response, the legal community has criticized that the prosecution often fails to properly investigate prosecutor misconduct cases and issues non-prosecution decisions, which led to the creation of HCID. However, the Supreme Prosecutors' Office insists it can handle the cases itself, ignoring the purpose of HCID's establishment.

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