Police Seize 141 Billion Won in Criminal Proceeds... 76% Increase from Last Year

707 Cases Confiscated from January to June... 227 Cases of Gambling Venue Introductions Most Frequent
Preservation Amount Largest in Specific Fraud Crimes at 57 Billion Won

The National Police Agency's National Investigation Headquarters announced on the 25th that during the first half of this year, they received 797 orders for seizure and confiscation preservation, securing assets worth a total of 141 billion KRW (prohibition of disposition).

Seizure and confiscation preservation is a system that freezes assets obtained through crimes until a final judgment is made, preventing their arbitrary disposal. The police can only apply for this at the pre-indictment stage. According to the police, the number of seizure and confiscation preservation cases has continuously increased since the establishment of the Crime Proceeds Tracking Task Force in 2019, showing a 76% increase compared to the first half of last year.

By case type, the most frequent was illegal gambling establishment operation with 227 cases, followed by specific fraud crimes with 187 cases, and prostitution mediation with 129 cases. In terms of the value of preserved assets, specific fraud crimes accounted for 57 billion KRW, illegal gambling establishment operation 36.1 billion KRW, and prostitution mediation 17.5 billion KRW. Notably, assets obtained through specific fraud crimes can be confiscated and preserved under the “Special Act on the Confiscation and Recovery of Corrupt Assets” and subsequently returned to victims.

In particular, in the first half of this year, the number of cases where frontline police station investigation teams directly preserved criminal proceeds increased by 161% compared to last year. The value of preserved assets surged by 1369% compared to the previous year. Until now, the tracking and preservation of criminal proceeds were mainly handled by investigation teams affiliated with metropolitan and provincial police agencies, but due to legal amendments and a significant increase in target crimes, frontline police stations can now directly apply for preservation.

A representative case is the Dobong Police Station in Seoul, which arrested a group that operated a fake coin mining company, deceiving investors by guaranteeing principal and a 60% monthly return, and embezzled approximately 3.6 billion KRW. The investigation team successfully tracked and seized assets worth about 3.1 billion KRW purchased with criminal proceeds by this group.

Additionally, during investigations into key crackdown targets such as jeonse fraud, drug crimes, and livelihood-related financial crimes in the first half of this year, the police preserved criminal proceeds worth approximately 59.52 billion KRW. This amount is about 2.9 times higher than the previous year.

The police plan to continuously strengthen their professional capabilities to respond to evolving criminal proceeds concealment activities and will do their utmost to ensure that not a single won of criminal proceeds is attributed to criminals.

A National Police Agency official stated, “Recovering all profits earned from crimes is a strict sanction against the crimes committed and an effective measure to eradicate future crimes,” adding, “We will continue to devote all efforts to preserving criminal proceeds to establish economic and financial order and achieve substantial victim recovery.”

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