Military prosecutors from the Ministry of National Defense's prosecution unit, who were brought to trial on charges of entering false information in the arrest warrant request for former Marine Corps Investigation Director General Park Jeong-hun, who investigated the death of Corporal Chae, were acquitted on the main charges at the first trial.
The Seoul Central District Court Criminal Agreement Division 24 (Presiding Judge Lee Young-seon) on the 12th acquitted Maj. Kim Min-jeong and Maj. Yeom Bo-hyeon, who were indicted on charges of drafting and using false official documents and abuse of authority leading to unlawful detention. At the time, Maj. Kim was Director General of the General Prosecution Division at the Ministry of National Defense's prosecution unit, and Maj. Yeom was head of the Public Criminal Division.
However, Maj. Yeom was found guilty of failing to appear at the National Assembly audit in Oct. 2024 and was fined 10 million won.
They were indicted on charges of inserting false content into the arrest warrant request for the former Director General Park, who was under investigation for insubordination on Aug. 30, 2023. At the time, former Director General Park was under investigation for allegedly defying the order of former Marine Corps Commandant Kim Gye-hwan and handing over the investigation records of Corporal Chae's death to the North Gyeongsang Provincial Police Agency.
The warrant request at issue stated that the former Director General Park's claims of former President Yoon Suk-yeol's fury and investigative pressure corresponded to "delusion." It also included details to the effect that the former Director General Park deleted mobile phone records and forced investigators to draft statements of fact.
The special counsel on the fallen Marine case viewed the two military prosecutors as having exercised an official document by submitting to the court a warrant request containing false content. The team also applied the charge of abuse of authority leading to unlawful detention, saying that after the pretrial detention hearing ended and until the court's rejection decision was issued, the former Director General Park was unlawfully detained for 6 hours and 46 minutes.
However, the court found it difficult to conclude, based solely on the evidence submitted by the special counsel, that Maj. Kim and Maj. Yeom drafted the warrant request knowing it was false. Even if the facts might have been misapprehended during the investigation, that does not immediately establish intent to draft a false official document.
The court also viewed the term "delusion" in the warrant request as closer to an opinion or judgment than to an entry of false fact. The court explained that even if somewhat extreme language was used, it is difficult to evaluate it as the crime of drafting a false official document.
The court said that even if it is later revealed that an investigative body made a judgment contrary to the facts, one should not conclude that the investigator at the time had intent to draft a false official document. The special counsel's failure to sufficiently prove the two individuals' motive for writing false content or a collusive relationship with superiors also formed a basis for the not-guilty verdict.
Because the court found that the charge of drafting a false official document did not stand, it also found not guilty on the charges of using a false official document and abuse of authority leading to unlawful detention, which were premised on it.