By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter
The Supreme Court overturned a high court ruling that convicted former Ministry of Finance and Economy director general Byeon Yang-ho of receiving kickbacks for influence peddling.
The top court Thursday sent the case back to the Seoul High Court, which previously sentenced him to five years in prison and fined him 150 million won. It said that due to a lack of evidence, the lower court's ruling could not be upheld.
Byeon was indicted for receiving 200 million won in 2001 and 2002 from Kim Dong-hun, former head of local accounting firm Ahn Kwon & Co., in exchange for helping write off the debt of Wia, a Hyundai Automotive Group affiliate, and Aju Metal, a subcontractor.
Kim was indicted for lobbying financial policymakers and CEOs of banks on behalf of Hyundai after receiving 4.1 billion won from the group in order to write off 200 billion won in debts at Wia and Aju Metal.
``If the court had not acknowledged Kim's claim of lobbying, he might have received heavy criminal punishment for swindling billions of won out of Hyundai under the pretext of lobbying. So we need to examine more carefully whether Kim's testimony is true or not,'' the top court said. Last December, the 55-year-old Byeon was also cleared of charges that he abused his public post to sell KEB at a below-market price to Lone Star.
The Supreme Court also reversed the guilty verdicts on Park Sang-bae, former Korea Development Bank (KDB) deputy governor, and Rhee Sung-kun, former chief executive of KDB Capital, who were indicted for taking 1.4 billion won and 100 million won from Kim, respectively. KDB was a creditor of the Hyundai affiliate and subcontractor.
The lower court ruling on Yon Won-young, the former KAMCO president who was given a 42-month jail term and a 50 million won fine for accepting 50 million won from Kim for the write-off, was upheld.
Kim claimed that of the 4.1 billion won, he gave two billion won to Byeon and the other figures. The higher court partially recognized his testimony, concluding that Byeon was not guilty and the others were. But the low court acknowledged the testimony, giving guilty verdicts to all of them, including a five-year prison term to Byeon.