By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter
Prosecutors investigating alleged embezzlement by degree scammer Shin Jeong-ah, said Tuesday they had found billions of won at the home of Shin's former boss while trying to confirm charges against both of them.
Shin's boss, Sungkok Art Museum director Park Moon-soon, 53, is the wife of former Ssangyong Group Chairman Kim Suk-won, and the investigation is likely to expand into alleged slush fund raising by the group. Investigators from the prosecution raided Park's home located on the third floor of the museum in central Seoul last Friday.
Prosecutors suspect that Shin embezzled some 200 million won in corporate sponsorships that were given to the gallery and also received rebates from artists for arranging sales of their artworks to companies. While admitting receiving the money, Shin maintained that she gave it all to Park.
``At Park's home, we found four to five billion won, mainly in checks. Where she had obtained the money was unclear. We suspect the money is from the Ssangyong Group owner's slush funds,'' a prosecutor at the Seoul Western District Prosecutors' Office said.
Ssangyong Group, once the nation's sixth largest conglomerate, was dissolved due to the owners' failure in management in conjunction with the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s.
Kim was arrested in 2004 on several charges including the misappropriation of 31 billion won in company funds, and was released on a special pardon last February. He is currently honorary chairman of Ssangyong Cement Industrial.
Prosecutors questioned Park over how she got the money. They also found 200 million won in foreign currency in a safety deposit box, which was opened under Shin's name at a bank near the museum, and concluded that it also belonged to Park. Park claimed that her friends collected the money for her and it was unrelated to the group.
The prosecution summoned workers from companies that sponsored the gallery Tuesday and asked whether the firms did so in order to curry favor with Shin's alleged ``sugar daddy'' Byeon Yang-kyoon, an ex-budget and planning minister and former Cheong Wa Dae policy planner.
In related news, Byeon was also questioned over the allegation that he exercised influence to illegally provide state subsidies to Bogwang Temple in Gyeonggi Province which he attended. If this allegation is confirmed, he will be charged with abuse of power.