'Cheonhyeondaeyu Unregistered Consulting Activities' Kwon Soon-il's First Instance Indictment Dismissed

Kwon Soon-il, former Supreme Court Justice (67, Judicial Research and Training Institute 14th term), who was indicted for engaging in legal activities at Cheonhyeondaeyu Asset Management without being registered as a lawyer, has been granted a dismissal of the indictment.

This decision is based on the grounds that the prosecution's investigation was unlawful, rendering the indictment invalid.

Presiding Judge Kim Dae-gyu of Criminal Division 21 at the Seoul Central District Court dismissed the indictment in the case of former Justice Kwon, who was prosecuted for violating the Attorney-at-Law Act, on the 11th.

After his retirement, from January to August 2021, former Justice Kwon served as a consultant for Cheonhyeondaeyu Asset Management, a company majorly owned by Daejangdong development businessman Kim Man-bae, and engaged in legal activities such as drafting legal documents, all without being registered as a lawyer with the Korean Bar Association. He was indicted in August 2024 on these charges.

During this period, he received 150 million won in consulting fees from Cheonhyeondaeyu.

The court explained, "The investigation in this case violated the laws and regulations that restrict the prosecutor's right to initiate investigations and grant primary investigative closing authority to judicial police officers," and stated, "The indictment itself is invalid as it violates legal provisions."

The court pointed out that the violation of the Attorney-at-Law Act, for which former Justice Kwon was charged, does not fall under the scope of criminal investigations that prosecutors are authorized to initiate according to the Prosecutors' Office Act.

In such cases, the authority to initiate an investigation is recognized only if the crime is directly related to another lawful investigation and is recognized by the prosecutor. However, the court determined that this case did not meet these criteria.

The violation of the Attorney-at-Law Act was not something the prosecutor recognized on their own but was merely content included in a complaint filed around September 2020.

Despite this, the court noted that the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office at the time initiated an investigation, including questioning the suspect.

The prosecution transferred the case to the Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency in January 2022 and then received it back in September of the following year. The court deemed this re-transfer procedure also unlawful.

This is because, although judicial police officers have the primary authority to conclude investigations by either forwarding cases to the prosecution or deciding not to forward them, the police in this instance transferred the case to the prosecution without exercising this authority.

The court stated, "After the prosecution unlawfully initiated an investigation, the case was transferred to judicial police, but the police only conducted a few investigations based on the premise of the prosecution's investigation initiation and cannot be considered to have embarked on a lawful investigative action," adding, "The prosecution receiving the case back and investigating it without the police exercising their primary investigative closing authority is merely a continuation of the prior unlawful investigation."

Following the verdict, former Justice Kwon told reporters, "I am grateful to the brave court that declared the law as it is," and said, "We must no longer tolerate the act of distorting the law for political purposes and fabricating charges by manipulating evidence."

He also expressed his anger, saying, "Is it possible in a rule-of-law country to conduct searches and seizures, forensic analysis of mobile phones, check telecommunication records of family members, and violate a person's human rights for five years?"