Moon Jae-in, the former president, was reported on the 23rd to have additionally appointed attorney Song Doo-hwan (Judicial Research and Training Institute Class 12), former chairperson of the National Human Rights Commission of Korea, who had served as the head of the National Assembly's legal counsel during the impeachment trial of former President Yoon Suk-yeol, to his defense team in the "bribery charges" case.

Song Du-hwan, co-representative of the parliamentary impeachment prosecution team and former chair of the National Human Rights Commission, is attending the 9th hearing of President Yoon Suk-yeol's impeachment trial at the Constitutional Court in Jongno-gu, Seoul, on February 18 and is stating his position. /Courtesy of News1

Class Hangyul, the law firm to which former Chairperson Song belongs, filed a notice of attorney appointment with the Criminal Division 21 of the Seoul Central District Court (presiding judge Lee Hyun-bok, Director General judge) handling Moon's case on the 10th. That was the day after the second preparatory hearing in the case was held on the 9th.

Attorney Song is a Class 12 peer of Moon Jae-in at the Judicial Research and Training Institute. He served as a judge at the Northern Branch of the Seoul District Court and at the Seoul Civil District Court, and opened a law practice in 1990. He later served as managing partner of the Han-Gyeol law firm and as president of Lawyers for a Democratic Society (MINBYUN), and in 2007 he was appointed a Constitutional Court justice upon the nomination of former President Roh Moo-hyun. In the Supreme Court appeal of then Gyeonggi Gov. Lee Jae-myung's election law violation case in 2019, Song served as defense counsel and won an acquittal. He was then appointed chairperson of the National Human Rights Commission of Korea in September 2021, at the end of the Moon Jae-in administration.

In addition, from December last year to early this year, Song, together with attorney Kim Yi-su (Class 9), a former Constitutional Court justice, served as co-head of the National Assembly's legal team for the impeachment prosecution in the impeachment trial of former President Yoon. He was later brought on as an adviser to Class Hangyul in August.

Meanwhile, the third preparatory hearing in this case is scheduled for Nov. 25. At that hearing, a decision is expected on whether to proceed with a jury trial.

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