The Supreme Court’s verdict on Cho Kuk, the leader of the Cho Kuk Innovation Party, who was sentenced to two years in prison in the first and second trials on charges of corruption in children’s entrance exams and ignoring the Blue House inspection, will be handed down on the 12th of next month. If the sentence is confirmed by the Supreme Court, Representative Cho will lose his seat as a member of the National Assembly under the Public Official Election Act and will not be able to run for the next presidential election.
According to the legal community on the 22nd, the 3rd Division of the Supreme Court (Chief Justice Eom Sang-pil) set the date for the appeal hearing of Representative Cho and his spouse, former Dongyang University professor Kyung-sim Jeong, as 11:45 a.m. on December 12. It has been five years since he was indicted in December 2019 and ten months since the second trial. The presiding judge, Justice Eom, had a history of serving as the presiding judge of the second trial of former Professor Jeong’s college entrance exam and private equity fund corruption case when he was the chief judge of the Seoul High Court and sentencing him to four years in prison.
Representative of the Cho Kuk Reform Party. Newsis
CEO Cho was handed over to trial on charges of corruption in his children’s entrance exams (obstruction of business, writing and holding false and forged official documents, forging private documents and holding events, etc.) and on charges of illegally accepting scholarships for his daughter Cho Min (bribery). There are also charges of violating the blind trust obligation under the Public Official Ethics Act and falsely reporting assets when inaugurated as Senior Secretary to the Blue House for Civil Affairs, and of ordering a private banker (PB) to hide the hard disk of his home PC (instruction to conceal evidence). He is also accused of ignoring the special inspection team’s inspection of former Busan City Deputy Mayor for Economic Affairs Yoo Jae-soo while serving as senior secretary for civil affairs (abuse of power and obstruction of the exercise of rights).
In February last year, the first trial found him guilty on most charges of corruption in children’s entrance exams and on the charge of interfering with the special investigation team’s exercise of rights and sentenced him to two years in prison. The second trial court also made the same decision as the first trial on all charges last February and maintained the two-year prison sentence. However, in both the first and second trials, court arrest was not made, saying there was no risk of destruction of evidence or escape. After appealing the second trial ruling, Representative Cho founded the Fatherland Innovation Party in the April 10 general election, received proportional representation, and entered the 22nd National Assembly.
Since all the main facts of the charges were acknowledged in the first and second trials, if the legal judgment of the Supreme Court, which is the legal reviewer, is confirmed without change, Representative Cho will lose his position as a member of the National Assembly and be imprisoned. If a prison sentence of more than one year is confirmed, voting rights will be restricted under the Public Official Election Act, so it is expected that he will lose his party membership in accordance with the Political Party Act and will have to resign from his position as party leader. The right to run for election is limited for 7 years, plus 5 years after the end of the sentence, so he cannot run in the next presidential election.
Reporter Jang Hye-jin janghj@segye.com
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Source: www.segye.com
