Prosecution Summons Former Special Prosecutor Park Young-soo of the '50 Billion Club'

Former special prosecutor Park Young-soo, who is allegedly involved in the so-called '50 Billion Club' scandal accused of receiving or promising to receive bribes from developers of the Daejang-dong project, appeared at the prosecution office.

Former Special Prosecutor Park Young-soo
Photo by Asia Economy DB

According to the legal community on the 22nd, the Anti-Corruption Investigation Division 1 of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office (Chief Prosecutor Eom Hee-jun) summoned former special prosecutor Park this morning as a suspect on charges including bribery under the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Economic Crimes and is currently investigating him.

Park is accused of promising approximately 20 billion KRW worth of land and commercial buildings from the Daejang-dong group in November 2014, when he was serving as chairman of the board of Woori Bank, in exchange for allowing the Seongnam-e Deul consortium to participate as an equity investor through Woori Bank.

Initially, Woori Bank considered participating as an investor in the Seongnam-e Deul consortium but ultimately decided not to participate in March 2015 due to opposition from the review department. Instead, it submitted a letter of intent for a 150 billion KRW project financing (PF) loan. As a result, the Seongnam-e Deul consortium received nearly perfect scores in the 'funding' category of the private business operator evaluation.

The prosecution suspects that as Woori Bank's role was reduced, the amount of bribes promised to former special prosecutor Park also decreased from 20 billion KRW to 5 billion KRW.

The prosecution is investigating whether the suspected 5 billion KRW promised was partially paid as advisory fees from Hwacheon Daeyu Asset Management to former special prosecutor Park and as loans to his daughter, and is examining the actual inflow of funds.

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