Prosecutor General Jeong Yu-mi, who claims she was effectively demoted when she was transferred to a high prosecutors' office prosecutor post in the senior prosecutors' reshuffle in December last year, criticized the Ministry of Justice in the first hearing of her suit to cancel the personnel order, saying the principles and system of personnel management had collapsed.
The Seoul Administrative Court's Administrative Division 5 (Presiding Judge Lee Jeong-won, Director General) on the 26th held the first hearing in Jeong's lawsuit seeking to cancel the personnel order against the Ministry of Justice and heard arguments from both sides. The panel closed arguments that day and said it would deliver a ruling on May 28.
Appearing in court in person, Jeong said, I have served in the prosecution for 25 years and received 18 personnel appointments, adding, Even if the appointments were somewhat unsatisfactory, I was able each time to steel myself and focus on my work because I could willingly accept that the appointments were made by a system and did not stray from principles.
Jeong argued that personnel management at the prosecution changed after Minister Jung Sung-ho took office at the Ministry of Justice. Jeong said, Since Minister Jeong took office, prosecution personnel appointments have seen the collapse of principles and systems, and the reasonable practices formed through numerous trials and errors have been denied, adding, In just eight months from late July last year, when Minister Jeong took office, to the present, there have been as many as five rounds of appointments at the Supreme Prosecutors' Office level.
She went on, Minister Jeong evaluated certain prosecutor generals and district branch chiefs as having excellent qualities and leadership and entrusted them with heavy responsibilities, but within just a few months demoted them en masse to high prosecutors' offices or the Legal Research and Training Institute simply because they put their names on a statement protesting the decision to forgo an appeal in the Daejang-dong development scandal, adding, Without special reason, downgrading a Supreme Prosecutors' Office–level prosecutor to a high prosecutors' office–level prosecutor was unprecedented and ran counter to the law and the principles of prosecutors' personnel management.
Jeong also asked for a prompt ruling. She said, If we merely wait, the prosecution will be dismantled, and the memories of the abnormal personnel and duty orders carried out until then will be buried in history, adding, Before the prosecution disappears into the back pages of history, I want to correct the unlawful personnel order and bring my 25-year career as a prosecutor to a close.
Jeong's side argued that the personnel action should be canceled as it deviated from and abused discretion by social norms. The Ministry of Justice, on the other hand, countered that it was an exercise of the Minister's legitimate personnel authority, making it difficult to even recognize an abuse of discretion.
Earlier, in January, the panel did not grant Jeong's request for an injunction. At the time, the court found that the Ministry of Justice's personnel measure appeared to be a disposition that effectively disadvantaged Jeong, but said it was difficult to see that an urgent need to prevent irreparable harm had been substantiated.
Jeong, who had been serving as a research fellow at the Legal Research and Training Institute, was transferred in the December personnel moves last year to a prosecutor at the Daejeon High Prosecutors' Office. She moved from the Supreme Prosecutors' Office level, equivalent to a prosecutor general level, to a high prosecutors' office prosecutor post, which is at the Vice Administrator/Director General prosecutor level. Many in the legal community view this as effectively a disciplinary personnel action. Jeong has taken a critical stance on major issues, including separating investigative and indictment powers, abolishing the Prosecution Service, and forgoing an appeal in the Daejang-dong development scandal.