It was belatedly revealed that a staffer of Busan mayoral candidate Chun Jae-soo of the Democratic Party of Korea smashed an office PC with a hammer just before a search and seizure by investigators during Chun's time as a lawmaker. The People Power Party pressed a coordinated offensive, saying there was no way Chun did not know.
According to the indictment of Chun's aides disclosed on the 12th by Rep. Joo Jin-woo of the People Power Party, Chun's staff conspired to destroy evidence just before a police search and seizure in Dec. last year.
On Dec. 10 last year, senior secretary A, then an aide to the lawmaker, ordered an intern secretary to reset the PC at the Busan district office in preparation for the search and seizure. A was found to have said, "A search and seizure could happen, so we must not give investigators anything to latch onto."
After receiving A's report, an aide ordered, "Back up any necessary data before the format (reset)," and A asked an eighth-grade secretary at Chun's Seoul office how to reset the PC. After finishing the PC format, A also damaged the storage devices. A disassembled the computer's hard disk with a screwdriver and struck it with a hammer, and bent and broke the SSD (solid-state drive) with hands and feet. The damaged storage devices were then discarded in a field near the residence and in a bathhouse trash can.
The joint investigation team sent four of Chun's aides, including A, to trial without detention. Whether they reported the PC reset and destruction to Chun was not included in the indictment.
The People Power Party argued that there was no way Chun did not know and said Chun should be held responsible. Rep. Joo said, "How could the aides have known intimate search-and-seizure information and gone so far as to destroy PCs in advance to eliminate evidence?" adding, "There is no way candidate Chun Jae-soo, the biggest beneficiary, did not know."
Rep. Joo said, "A 24-year-old intern secretary was unfairly indicted just months after starting work and faces a bleak future," adding, "Candidate Chun should not hide behind a 24-year-old intern but take responsibility himself."
Kwak Gyu-taek, the People Power Party's senior spokesperson for the floor, also said in a commentary, "Even as the indictment specifies concrete circumstances of organized evidence destruction, it is difficult to confirm anywhere whether the aides reported this to Rep. Chun Jae-soo, and whether there were direct orders from Rep. Chun Jae-soo to destroy evidence," adding, "We cannot help but ask the joint investigation team whether this organized crime—where a senior secretary ordered an intern to reset a PC and the Seoul and Busan offices acted in concert—was carried out voluntarily without the permission of the final manager, Rep. Chun Jae-soo."
Chief spokesperson Choi Bo-yoon also said, "We are appalled that a method of covering up crime seen only in movies was carried out in the office of a sitting Democratic Party lawmaker," criticizing it as "a clear display of the Democratic Party's unique 'evidence-destruction DNA' that spares no means or methods to hide their crimes."