Former Vice President of Korea Curling Federation Sentenced to 1 Year in Prison for Hiring Hometown Junior Illegally

Former Vice President of the Korea Curling Federation, Kang Mo (70), who was prosecuted on charges of changing hiring conditions to recruit a hometown junior as a team leader, was sentenced to prison in the first trial.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

On the 22nd, Judge Jung Won of the Seoul Eastern District Court Criminal Division 11 sentenced Kang, who was indicted without detention on charges of obstruction of business, to one year in prison and ordered his immediate detention in court.

The court judged that Kang committed irregularities to hire his hometown junior, Kim, as the office team leader in order to effectively control the federation, stating, "The Curling Federation, which had already been designated as a management organization and was unable to operate normally even before Kim Jae-hong took office as president, fell into deep confusion after this incident and has only recently been normalized." The court added, "While it cannot be said that all of this is solely the responsibility of Kang and Kim, it is undeniable that they bear significant responsibility."

In 2019, while serving as the federation's vice president, Kang was prosecuted for giving additional points for qualifications unrelated to the job, such as a real estate agent license, and excluding highly competitive high-scoring candidates from the interview process in order to select his hometown junior, Kim Mo (60), for the experienced office team leader position.

Kim was actually hired as the team leader. Kim was also indicted without detention as an accomplice in the obstruction of business charges and was sentenced to eight months in prison with a two-year probation and 160 hours of community service.

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