Special counsel prosecutors on Sunday sought a 20-year prison term for Park Sung-jae, a former justice minister on trial for allegedly taking part in the Dec. 3 martial law episode and acting on a request tied to an investigation involving first lady Kim Keon-hee.
The team led by special counsel Cho Eun-seok asked the Seoul Central District Court’s Criminal Division 33, presided over by Judge Lee Jin-kwan, to sentence Park to 20 years in prison on charges including playing a key role in an insurrection and abuse of power.
In closing arguments, the special counsel team described Park as a “legal technician who destroys the law,” arguing that he knew the emergency martial law declared by Yoon Suk Yeol lacked constitutional requirements but still offered ideas to give it the appearance of legality and mislead the public.
Prosecutors said Park’s actions immediately after the declaration — moving to the Justice Ministry complex in Gwacheon and ordering an emergency standby for the travel-ban team, reviewing the dispatch of prosecutors to a joint investigation headquarters, and checking prison capacity — amounted to concrete steps to carry out the alleged insurrection. They said the measures were meant to isolate resisting opponents and process them through the justice system, adding that Park “turned the Justice Ministry overnight into an instrument for executing an insurrection.”
On the allegation of collusion involving the first lady, prosecutors said Park accepted what they called a directive-like request from the president’s spouse, a private citizen, and exercised law-enforcement authority arbitrarily. “This was not communication but active collusion,” they said.
They urged the court to impose a severe sentence, saying it must “send a warning to those who destroy the law in the name of the law.”
Park has denied the charges, saying he carried out normal duties under relevant laws. The first-trial verdict has drawn public attention because the case involves what prosecutors described as an unprecedented justice minister accused of joining an insurrection.
According to the special counsel’s investigation, Park is accused of sequentially joining Yoon’s alleged insurrection after Yoon declared emergency martial law on Dec. 3, 2024. Prosecutors say Park convened a meeting of senior officials at the Justice Ministry, ordered staff responsible for travel bans to report to work, and directed reviews of sending prosecutors to a joint investigation headquarters and checking prison capacity. He is also accused of having the ministry’s prosecution bureau draft an “abuse of authority document” containing arguments to justify martial law shortly after it was lifted.
Park is also accused of ordering staff to confirm details after receiving a Telegram message from Kim last May asking him to determine the progress of an investigation. The allegation arose after then-Prosecutor General Lee Won-seok instructed the formation of an investigative team over suspicions that Kim received a luxury bag.
Separately, the special counsel team sought a three-year prison term for Lee Wan-kyu, a former head of the Korea Legislation Research Institute, who was indicted for perjury before the National Assembly under the Act on Testimony, Appraisal, etc. at the National Assembly. Lee is accused of falsely testifying that there was no discussion of martial law at a post-lifting “safe house meeting.”
Lee told the court the gathering was merely social, but prosecutors argued that, amid a grave political situation in which a presidential impeachment bill had been introduced, key aides meeting while carrying stacks of documents amounted to a countermeasure session to develop arguments to justify martial law. They also said Lee deliberately committed perjury by reducing the number of attendees in his testimony from five to four.
* This article has been translated by AI.
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