A second comprehensive special counsel team investigating unresolved allegations after the three earlier special counsel probes said it will resume a search and seizure of the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office’s e-Pros server, focusing on allegations that former Prosecutor General Shim Woo-jung was involved in the Dec. 3 martial law episode.
The team, led by Special Counsel Kwon Chang-young, said it will restart execution of the warrant at 2 p.m. on May 7 at the National Information Resources Service’s Gwangju Center, under on-site direction by Assistant Special Counsel Kwon Young-bin.
The move continues a warrant execution that began April 24 and was halted late at night. It is the first time, the report said, that a search-and-seizure warrant has been executed covering the entire e-Pros server.
Investigators suspect Shim, during the martial law period, reviewed sending prosecutors to a joint martial law investigation headquarters at the direction of then-Justice Minister Park Sung-jae. They are also examining allegations that Park spoke by phone with Shim several times around a Justice Ministry senior staff meeting.
The special counsel is expected to secure internal prosecution messenger records and reports from that period to confirm how the prosecutor-dispatch review was handled and who directed it.
The team is also looking into how prosecutors in March last year decided to forgo an immediate appeal of a court decision canceling the detention of former President Yoon Suk Yeol. Shim cited possible constitutional issues and directed that no immediate appeal be filed, leading to Yoon’s release.
* This article has been translated by AI.
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