A sitting judge accused of receiving 33 million won ($24,000) worth of money and favors from a regional law firm attorney in exchange for favorable rulings has been indicted.
The Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO) Investigation Division 2, led by Chief Prosecutor Kim Soo-hwan, announced Monday that it had indicted without detention Chief Judge Kim on charges of violating the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes (bribery) and attorney Jung, a high school alumnus who provided the bribes, on charges including bribery.
The defendants are senior and junior alumni from the same high school. They had little contact before Kim was assigned to the Jeonju District Court, but over the two years following his assignment, they spoke on the phone and shared dinners approximately 190 times while multiple trials were underway, according to the investigation.
According to the CIO, during his tenure at the Jeonju District Court from 2023 to 2025, Judge Kim served as presiding judge and reduced sentences from the first trial in 17 of 21 appellate cases handled by the law firm Jung heads. In exchange for these favorable rulings, from March 2024 to April 2025, Kim received free use of a building owned by a company in which Jung and others are shareholders, using it as a violin studio for his wife and gaining approximately 14 million won in benefits. Jung also paid 15 million won in construction costs for soundproofing facilities for the studio, and Kim received a nut gift box containing 3 million won in cash. Including the free rental benefits, the total amount received was 33 million won.
The CIO believes that in all six cases sentenced after March 2024, when the commercial space was provided free of charge, Kim overturned the lower court rulings. The overturned cases included numerous crimes directly affecting public welfare, such as drunk driving, drugs and voice phishing. In one example, a defendant had been sentenced to five months in prison for drunk driving in the first trial, with prior convictions for drunk driving that resulted in fines and a repeat drunk driving offense during a suspended sentence period for a separate drunk driving charge. Despite this, the original prison sentence was overturned on appeal and replaced with a fine.
Rumors about the relationship between the two spread at the prison near the court where Kim was serving, and many inmates reportedly requested Jung for release and other legal services. Many clients paid legal fees ranging from tens of millions to hundreds of millions of won after hearing these rumors. In some cases, tens of millions of won in fees were paid upfront on the premise that release would be secured.
"In Chief Judge Kim's cases, we obtained recorded visitation files showing that rumors circulated within the prison that sentences could be reduced by retaining attorney Jung's law firm," said Choi Hyung-jin, a prosecutor with the CIO Investigation Division 2. "When a prison sentence handed down after thorough deliberation in the first trial is reduced to a suspended sentence on appeal, that would have been quite a significant 'event' among prison inmates."
The CIO exercised its right to request transfer of the case in May last year, one month after a complaint was filed with the Jeonbuk Provincial Police Agency in April. From September last year to January this year, the CIO conducted searches and seizures at the Jeonju District Court and the residences of Kim and Jung. On March 19, the CIO sought arrest warrants for both on charges of bribery acceptance and bribery under the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes, but the court rejected both warrants citing insufficient grounds. The CIO did not re-apply for the arrest warrants and instead conducted additional supplementary investigations before deciding to indict without detention.
"We have uncovered the fact that a sitting chief judge received bribes mediated by trials from a defense attorney in cases he was presiding over," the CIO said. "We will continue to strictly punish corruption crimes that undermine trust in the judiciary in accordance with law and principle."
