Jeon Seong-bae, known as "Geonjin," who was indicted on charges of colluding with Kim Keon-hee to receive money and valuables from the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification (Unification Church) along with requests to handle church agenda items, was sentenced to five years in prison on appeal. That is one year less than the first-trial sentence of six years in prison.
The Criminal Division 13 of the Seoul High Court (High Court Judges Kim Mu-shin, Lee Woo-hee and Yoo Dong-gyun) on the 21st sentenced Jeon, who was detained and indicted on charges including brokered bribery under the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes, to five years in prison. The court also ordered the forfeiture of one seized Graff necklace and the collection of 180.78 million won.
The court found Jeon guilty of the main charges of brokered bribery, as in the first trial. It held that Jeon, between April and July 2022, accepted requests from a Unification Church affiliate for support for the church and delivered to the first lady items including a Chanel bag and a diamond necklace worth about 80 million won. It also found him guilty of taking 30 million won from a Unification Church affiliate while demanding an adviser position at the Unification Group.
The court weighed the first lady's status and Jeon's role heavily in sentencing. "The president's spouse is the person who can exert more influence than anyone else from the closest position to the president and also performs public activities such as diplomacy," the court said. "The president's spouse is required to have the highest moral integrity, probity and public responsibility," it said.
It continued, "After Yoon Suk-yeol was elected president, the defendant used a private relationship with Kim Keon-hee to exert influence through Kim Keon-hee over members of the National Assembly and senior government officials and supported the Unification Church, a religious organization," adding, "In the process, the defendant pursued personal gain." It also said, "The defendant continuously conveyed (the requests) related to the Unification Church to Yoon Suk-yeol through Kim Keon-hee, and as a result, entanglement between religion and government occurred," noting, "This led to the infringement of the constitutional value of separation of religion and state."
In addition to the Unification Church-related charges, the appeals court also found Jeon guilty of charges involving requests from corporations. From July 2022 to January last year, Jeon is accused of receiving a little over 45 million won under the pretext of requests and brokering related to a tax audit and a criminal complaint case of Corporation A. From September 2022 to October 2023, he was also charged with receiving a little over 160 million won under the pretext of requests and brokering related to business promotion by Corporation B.
However, as in the first trial, the court found Jeon not guilty of violating the Political Funds Act over allegations that he received 100 million won along with a request for a People Power Party nomination from North Gyeongsang Provincial Council member Park Chang-uk ahead of the 2022 local elections. The reasoning was that it is difficult to view Jeon at the time as a "person engaged in politics" under the Political Funds Act, and the money Park handed over cannot be seen as political funds for Jeon's political activities.
The sentence was reduced because Jeon admitted part of the charges during the trial and submitted evidence. The court found that Jeon's statements and evidence submission fall under mandatory mitigation grounds in the Kim Keon-hee special prosecutor law. "After this case was indicted, the defendant admitted to providing money and valuables to Kim Keon-hee and appeared as a witness at Kim Keon-hee's first trial to acknowledge delivering the valuables, which became key evidence," the court said.
In the first trial, the court did not recognize mitigation, saying Jeon's denial during the investigation delayed the probe for a long time. The appeals court, however, found that mitigation grounds set by law cannot be excluded solely because different statements were made at the investigation stage. Earlier, the first trial had sentenced Jeon to six years in prison, higher than the five-year term sought by the Kim Keon-hee special prosecutor.