65.3 Billion Funds Can’t or Won’t Be Revealed

The police sought an arrest warrant for Min Kyung-chan, a relative of President Roh Moo-hyun, on February 6 on charges of fraud while raising illegal investment funds. A warrant seems to be issued on February 7 as Min gave up asking the court to reconsider it.

Min allegedly swindled Park, a realty dealer, out of his money with a right to manage restaurants in a hospital he had promoted to build for a decoy. He is on a charge of receiving 535 million won from Park from July to December.

Lee Sang-won, head of a special police investigative team, said, “Min concealed that he actually could not build the hospital as he was a credit defaulter.”

The police are also investigating the procured statements that Min received a large amount of money from a couple of people by suggesting rights to run a store and a coffee shop in the hospital.

The police summoned several people from Min’s account book and memos, and re-summoned three out of 12 who had already been investigated on February 6 for more information.

Lee said, “The investigation is progressing favorably, but something essential hasn’t been revealed. We are focusing on whether Min actually raised a big sum of investment funds and if the process was illegal.”

The police considered securing Min’s telephone call records of the past three months and tracing the records of several bank accounts that belong to people who talked over the phone with him.

“We have already chased some of the accounts with a warrant. There’s a low possibility, however, that Min raised funds for building a hospital,” said an official from the police.

Meanwhile, Rep. Cho Jae-hwan of Millennium Democratic Party (MDP) asserted, “The president and his wife sent a New Year’s card to a representative of M Company that had contracted a computer program with the hospital. It shows Cheong Wa Dae may have been involved in this scandal.”

mungchii@donga.com roryrery@donga.com