Prosecution indicted a man, Kim, 68, Monday, who extorted some 180 million won ($155,000) from people involved in a civil dispute.
On June 2010, he approached them, and faked being close with the judge who had their case. Kim then talked them into bribing him. He ripped off the money five times, and spent it all on daily expenses.
Having lost the case, he then approached the opposing counsel, and threatened him that an audit would be in order unless he gets 30 million won ($26,000).
In a separate case, he took 20 million won from another person, saying that he can dismiss the audit since he’s close with the head of the NTS (National Tax Service).
He turned out to have no personal relationship whatsoever with any of the people he mentioned, according to the investigation. He was actually on probation for similar crimes the whole time.
The prosecution said, “Fraud in legal cases undercuts the trust of society on which we’re basing our relationship, and crackdown should come down hard on such cases accordingly.”