Is special probe protecting Pres. Lee`s family?

Independent counsel Lee Gwang-beom has charged with dereliction of duty the presidential security office, which handled the land purchase for President Lee Myung-bak’s retirement home. The prosecutor said the office paid part of the sale price that should have been borne by the president`s son Lee Shi-hyeong, causing damage to the government. In their probe earlier, prosecutors had cleared all who were implicated in the scandal of charges by accepting the presidential office’s claims. Lee Gwang-beom did not charge the same things on the president`s family, who were to enjoy financial gains due to dereliction of duty committed by three security members, including Kim Jong-in, former head of the presidential security office. So how people who committed dereliction of duty were indicted while those who achieved gains for their acts were acquitted seem to defy common sense.

On the suspicion that Lee Shi-hyeong and his mother, First Lady Kim Yoon-ok, committed dereliction of duty, the special prosecutor chose to acquit them, saying they were not involved in the land distribution and pricing. The independent probe concluded that prosecutors had no “right of arraignment” over President Lee, avoiding deciding whether he could be charged. This decision was made because under the Constitution, the president shall not be criminally charged (investigation and indictment) except for the crimes of rebellion or collusion with foreign forces over his or her term, but could be summoned by a court as a witness or indicted after the term ends.

The independent counsel considered the case an illegal transfer of wealth, which the presidential couple paid the purchase price of the land, whose real owner was their son, rather than entrust ownership in which the couple as the owner of the property bought it by borrowing their son’s name. Considering the characteristics of this transaction, which was canceled before being finalized, the special counsel had no choice but to rely mostly on testimonies from those involved in conducting the probe. The presidential office might have sought to get a legal reaction meant to avoid violation of the Real Name Real Estate Ownership Act. The special counsel also discovered that the chief of the facility management division at President Lee’s security office fabricated the contract document. Since the National Tax Service can file criminal charges for illegal transfer of wealth for assets exceeding 2.5 billion won (2.3 million U.S. dollars), criminal penalties cannot be imposed for this offense.

At this point, it is difficult to tell if the presidential couple was unaware that the security office signed a land purchase contract to enable their family to achieve financial gains, but the transaction was neither clean nor transparent. Regardless of whether it was a case of entrustment of land ownership or illegal transfer of wealth, it is also a shame that the first family is under suspicion.

An independent probe was inevitable largely because prosecutors failed to play their due roles. They acquitted all of those involved in the case, saying that if presidential office staff were punished for dereliction of duty, President Lee’s family would benefit from their offense, a line of reasoning that is hard to understand. If prosecutors had indicted presidential office staff under law in their probe, there would have been no need to appoint a special counsel. Prosecutors should atone for erring in their investigation to sympathize with the presidential office.