Deputy Chief Park Eun-jeong under Investigation by Central District Prosecutors' Office Anti-Corruption Division for Alleged Cover-up of Seongnam FC Probe

Park Eun-jung, Chief Prosecutor of Seongnam Branch./Photo by Seongnam Branch website capture.

[Asia Economy Reporter Choi Seok-jin, Legal Affairs Specialist] The Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office's Anti-Corruption Division will investigate the case in which Park Eun-jung, head of the Seongnam Branch, was accused of covering up the investigation into the 'Seongnam FC sponsorship fund' case.

According to the prosecution on the 7th, the Anti-Corruption and Violent Crime Investigation Division 2 (Chief Prosecutor Jo Ju-yeon) of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office has been assigned the case filed by the civic group 'Committee for the Protection of the Livelihood of Ordinary People' against Park Eun-jung and is currently reviewing related materials.

The group accused Park of repeatedly ignoring Deputy Chief Prosecutor Park Ha-young's recommendations that supplementary or direct investigations were necessary regarding the Seongnam FC allegations, and filed a complaint against Park at the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office last month.

Deputy Chief Prosecutor Park expressed his resignation on the prosecution's internal network on the 25th of last month, stating, "I am leaving a little earlier than I had thought. I tried to find other ways to continue working, but after much consideration and response, there was no other way."

This led to suspicions inside and outside the prosecution that Deputy Chief Prosecutor Park and others had reported that a reinvestigation or a request for supplementary investigation to the police was necessary, but Park Eun-jung deliberately delayed the decision by stalling.

Park Eun-jung, who served as the Ministry of Justice's Inspection Officer during former Minister of Justice Choo Mi-ae's tenure and led the disciplinary action against then Prosecutor General Yoon Seok-youl before being promoted, is considered a representative pro-government prosecutor within the prosecution. For this reason, controversy arose suggesting that Park intentionally blocked the investigation into this case involving the ruling party's presidential candidate, which may have been the reason for Deputy Chief Prosecutor Park's resignation.

As suspicions spread, the Seongnam Branch issued a statement saying, "The Seongnam Branch is reviewing the investigation records of the Seongnam Branch and police investigation records in accordance with laws and principles," and added, "The reports claiming that the branch ordered the termination of the investigation or blocked requests for supplementary investigations are not true, so we ask for careful reporting."

However, subsequent media reports and explanations from the Seongnam Branch revealed that the request for Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) data on the Seongnam FC sponsorship groups, which was made under Deputy Chief Prosecutor Park's authority, was rejected by the Supreme Prosecutors' Office. Later, Park changed the Criminal Division 3, which was reviewing the Seongnam FC case and handling major cases such as special, public security, and corporate investigations, by transferring these to Criminal Divisions 1 and 2, leaving Division 3 to focus on drug and organized crime investigations. Additionally, the FIU data request, previously authorized by the deputy chief, was changed to require the branch chief's approval, further fueling controversy.

The 'Seongnam FC allegations' originated in 2018 when the Bareunmirae Party filed a criminal complaint, alleging that Lee Jae-myung, the Democratic Party presidential candidate, who was the club owner during his tenure as Seongnam mayor, secured large sponsorship funds from companies in exchange for resolving corporate issues.

After the Seongnam Ilhwa soccer team was transformed into the citizen soccer team Seongnam FC and Lee became the club owner, six companies based in Seongnam?Doosan Construction (4.2 billion KRW), Naver (3.9 billion KRW), Nonghyup (3.6 billion KRW), Bundang CHA Hospital (3.3 billion KRW), Hyundai Department Store (500 million KRW), and Alphadom City (550 million KRW)?provided a total of 16.05 billion KRW to Seongnam FC from 2015 to 2017 under the names of sponsorship and advertising fees.

In June 2018, the Bareunmirae Party filed a complaint against Lee with the Seongnam Branch on charges of third-party bribery. Similar to how several large corporations' substantial donations to the Mir and K-Sports Foundations during former President Park Geun-hye's administration were considered bribes, it was alleged that these companies, which own major facilities in Seongnam, supported Seongnam FC indirectly as a means to expect issue resolution or to facilitate specific civil complaints such as building permits or land use changes through Lee.

Some have even raised suspicions that part of the Seongnam FC sponsorship funds was deposited into related sports organizations in Seongnam and then withdrawn in cash.

After the Bareunmirae Party's complaint, the police (Bundang Police Station), which took over the case, delayed for three years and three months before deciding in September last year to dismiss the case due to insufficient evidence. Following the complainant's objection, the Seongnam Branch took over the case but did not decide on whether to reinvestigate even after four months.

As the controversy grew, Prosecutor General Kim Oh-soo ordered an investigation by Suwon District Prosecutors' Office Chief Shin Sung-sik last month, but even two weeks after the allegations surfaced, no statements were taken from the investigation team members, raising suspicions of a 'poor investigation.'

Furthermore, Prosecutor General Kim explained that the reason for rejecting Deputy Chief Prosecutor Park's FIU data request was that it included information related to other companies under police investigation besides Naver, which was separately reported to the prosecution. However, since the other company-related cases investigated by the police have all been transferred to the prosecution following objections from the parties involved, there has been no progress in the investigation, including the FIU data request.

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