By Yi Whan-woo
The prosecution indicted former police chief Cho Hyun-oh on charges of making defamatory remarks about the late President Roh Moo-hyun who ended his life following allegations of corruption.
Roh’s bereaved family filed a complaint against Cho, 57, for remarks made in March 2010. The former commissioner general of the National Police Agency said that the police found a large sum of money belonging to Roh in a bank account under someone else’s name. He committed suicide during an ongoing investigation in May 2009, a year after he left the presidential office.
The prosecution conducted a probe on his family members for allegedly taking illicit funds from an entrepreneur who had a close relationship with Roh. Prosecutors had also summoned and grilled the late president. Cho also allegedly said that former first lady Kwon Yang-suk asked the then-ruling Uri Party, the predecessor of the Democratic United Party, not to push forward with the special investigation into the slush fund allegations.
Cho consistently claimed that his words were based on investigative documents from the Central Investigation Unit of the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office, which handles large-scale bribery cases.
He also said that his remarks concerning Kwon were from a “recognized and trustworthy” political figure whose name he refused to reveal.
The investigators, however, said they have not found any relevant evidence to support his claims.
The Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office launched an investigation into his allegation after Cho stepped down from the post in April in response to a public uproar because the police mishandled an incident involving the murder of a woman whose body was dismembered.