A remand decision came nine years after the divorce and asset division suit between Chey Tae-won, chairman of SK Group, and Roh Soh-yeong, director of Art Center Nabi, began. The court ruled that Chey must pay Roh 944 billion won as asset division. As Chey's side said it would review the written judgment before stating a position, there remains a possibility the two sides' legal battle will go back to the Supreme Court.
The Family Division 1 of the Seoul High Court (Presiding Judge Lee Sang-joo, senior judge) on the 24th included Chey's shares in SK Co., Ltd. in the asset division and set the partitioning ratio at two-thirds for Chey and one-third for Roh. Although it is less than the 1.3808 trillion won recognized by the appeals court before remand, it is more than 14 times the 66.5 billion won in the first trial.
The two met and dated while studying abroad at the University of Chicago in the United States, and held their wedding at the Blue House state guesthouse in Sept. 1988. The marriage drew public attention as the union of the daughter of then-President Roh Tae-woo and the eldest son of the chairman of Sunkyong Group. They have three children.
Married life was not entirely smooth. When Sunkyong Group was selected as the second mobile telecommunications operator in the early 1990s, suspicions were raised that the administration had granted special favors. The two were investigated by prosecutors over allegations of illegally taking foreign currency out of the country but were cleared, and they were again brought under investigation during the former president Roh's slush fund case.
Their rupture became public in Dec. 2015. In a letter to the media, Chey said he had experienced deep conflict with Roh for more than 10 years. He also disclosed the existence of a child born from an extramarital relationship.
Chey applied for divorce mediation with the court in July 2017. Roh initially opposed the divorce, but in Dec. 2019 she filed a countersuit indicating she would accept it. At the time, Roh posted on social media (SNS) that she thought it would be right to let Chey find the "happiness" he wanted.
The bench's findings varied greatly at each level. In Dec. 2022, the first trial viewed SK Co., Ltd. shares as Chey's personal property and recognized 100 million won in damages and 6.65 billion won in asset division. In May 2024, the appeals court judged the SK Co., Ltd. shares to be joint property, raising damages to 2 billion won and the asset division to 1.3808 trillion won.
In Oct. last year, the Supreme Court finalized the divorce and damages while remanding only the asset division. It held that even if 30 billion won from former President Roh's slush funds had been delivered to SK, the illicit money could not be evaluated as Roh's contribution to forming the assets.
On remand, the court excluded the 30 billion won in slush funds from Roh's contribution but still viewed the SK Co., Ltd. shares themselves as subject to asset division. It found that Roh's household, child-rearing, and external activities related to the group contributed to maintaining and increasing the value of the shares.
After the ruling, Chey's legal representative said, "In a process of dissolution of marriage approaching about 20 years, the divorce was finalized by the Supreme Court ruling last year, and today there was the remand judgment on the asset division. Chey feels sorry for having caused concern to many people during the process so far."
The representative added, "We will provide a detailed position on the ruling after carefully reviewing the written judgment."
Although it did not explicitly state whether it would file another appeal, it is interpreted as leaving open the possibility of again seeking the Supreme Court's judgment after reviewing the ruling's content and legal principles.
If a further appeal is filed, the Supreme Court will again examine whether the remand court calculated Roh's contribution and the assets subject to partitioning in line with the remand's intent. It is still not certain whether the legal battle of the two, dubbed the "divorce of the century," will end after nine years.