Prosecutors Losing Investigation Rights Over 'Public Officials and Election Crimes'... Muddy June Local Elections

Speaker of the National Assembly Park Byeong-seok is taking a commemorative photo holding the mediation agreement on the 'Complete Removal of Prosecution's Investigation Rights' bill with the ruling and opposition floor leaders at the National Assembly on the afternoon of the 22nd. [Image source=Yonhap News]

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[Asia Economy Reporter Heo Kyung-jun] As the Democratic Party of Korea and the People Power Party have effectively agreed on the ‘complete prosecution investigation reform bill,’ the prosecution is poised to be reorganized into a public prosecution office solely responsible for indictment and trials.

According to the legal community on the 24th, under the mediation proposal by National Assembly Speaker Park Byeong-seok regarding the complete prosecution investigation reform bill, all direct investigative powers of the prosecution will disappear 1 year and 6 months after the launch of the National Assembly’s Judicial Reform Special Committee.

Investigations will be conducted by the police, the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO), and the newly established Serious Crime Investigation Office (SCIO) according to the mediation proposal. The prosecution can only conduct supplementary investigations on cases transferred by the police, cases where the prosecution has requested corrective measures, or cases where the complainant has raised objections, provided that the ‘unity’ and ‘identity’ of the crime are not violated. In other words, the prosecution will no longer be able to expand the given case to conduct additional investigations or carry out separate supplementary investigations during the process.

Ultimately, the existing criminal justice system, where the prosecution was responsible for both investigation and indictment, is entering a period of major transformation.

The prosecution has sharply criticized the mediation proposal to abolish its investigative powers as a ‘political collusion’ between the ruling and opposition parties. Despite the fact that the prosecution’s direct investigative authority has already been significantly reduced to six major crimes due to last year’s adjustment of investigative powers between the police and prosecution, the prosecution argues that stripping all investigative powers without sufficient discussion suggests ulterior motives behind the scenes.

The mediation proposal removes four major crimes, including ‘public official and election crimes,’ from the six major crimes under Article 4, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 1, Item (a) of the Prosecution Service Act, which prosecutors can initiate investigations on. The legal community widely agrees that the political sphere feared the prosecution because it checked the ‘elected powers’ by investigating public officials and election crimes. However, with the prosecution no longer able to investigate public official and election crimes, concerns are growing that the means to punish political figures have disappeared.

In particular, under the Moon Jae-in administration’s anti-corruption policy, the prosecution’s investigations into ‘abuse of authority’ charges against officials from the Park Geun-hye administration will no longer be possible, making it unlikely that investigations into allegations of misconduct by high-ranking officials in the current government will proceed. Although the police have investigative authority over public official crimes, it is impossible for them to quickly acquire the expertise needed to investigate abuse of authority crimes, which involve complex legal reasoning and are difficult to prove.

Regarding election crimes, concerns are raised that significant problems will arise starting with the local elections in June. According to the mediation proposal, the complete prosecution investigation reform bill will be processed within this month, and the related amendments to the Prosecution Service Act and the Criminal Procedure Act will take effect four months after their promulgation.

In this case, from August to September, the prosecution will no longer be able to directly investigate election crimes and will have to rely on police investigations to decide whether to indict. The problem is that the statute of limitations for election offenders under current law is only six months, so if the police transfer cases close to the expiration of the statute of limitations, there is a high possibility that cases will be sent to trial or dismissed without ‘cross-checking.’

Ultimately, during the transitional period as the complete prosecution investigation reform-related laws are implemented and settled, the dominant opinion is that the likelihood of power-related crimes such as public official and election crimes being concealed has increased. A lawyer who is a former judge analyzed, “The criminal justice system was changed within a short period without gathering opinions or deliberations from academia, the legal community, or practitioners. The adjustment of investigative powers has not been settled, the CIO is not functioning properly, yet investigative powers are being divided and the SCIO is being established, which is a bizarre situation.”

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