Former head of Yangcheon-gu Office arrested on bribery charge

Prosecutors enter the office of Kim Soo-young, head of Yangcheon-gu Office in southwestern Seoul, Nov. 26, to search and seize evidence regarding the allegation that she received a bribe from a businessman through her husband in 2014. / Korea Times

By Kim Jae-heun

Lee Je-hak, former chief of Yangcheon-gu Office and husband of the current district head Kim Soo-young, was arrested, Monday, for allegedly receiving an illegal political donation from a businessman after his wife was elected to the position of district head in 2014.

The Seoul Southern District Court issued an arrest warrant for Lee, saying he was likely to destroy evidence related to the charge and flee.

The arrest came about two weeks after prosecutors searched Kim's office to seize relevant evidence.

The investigation followed a complaint filed by a civic group, the Public Welfare Committee (PWC), last October. In the complaint, the group claimed Lee received 30 million won ($25,142) from a businessman under the pretext of offering him “congratulatory money” after his wife succeeded in local elections in June 2014.

The PWC argues that Lee accepted the 30 million won as well as hundreds of millions of won from others, and that Kim knew about her husband receiving kickbacks but connived at it, giving favorable treatment to the kickback providers.

As Lee denied the bribery allegations, prosecutors submitted security camera footage of him receiving money from the businessman as evidence to the court. The businessman provided the footage to the prosecution recently.

The civic group said the footage shows that a man holding bundles of 50,000 won bills wrapped in newspaper came into an office to meet a person who appears to be Lee. Then, the man took out the money from the newspaper and put it into a document envelope to hand it over.

In an interview with a local daily, the businessman acknowledged the bribe offering and said he gave money to Lee so tathat Lee and his wife would help his business by speeding up some administrative procedures in his favor.

Kim said in a statement that she and her husband did not receive money in return for business favors.

Lee was elected as head of Yangcheon-gu Office in 2010 but was stripped of the position after one year following court rulings over violations of the Public Official Election Act, for which he was fined 2.5 million won for spreading false information about a rival candidate.

Then, his wife Kim ran for the same position in 2014 and was elected. Last year, she was re-elected.

The two politicians have been a symbolic activist couple. When they were university students in 1986, Lee was president of the student body at Sogang University and Kim was head of the student body at Ewha Womans University. Kim started her political career in 1992 and Lee followed suit in 1998.