(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Kim Bit-na = Chief Judge Koo Hoe-geun (58, 22nd class of the Judicial Research and Training Institute), who acquitted Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon, was the same person who previously found former President Yoon Seok-yeol not guilty in the appeals court for violating the political fund law.
According to the legal community on the 23rd, Chief Judge Koo is from Gwangyang, Jeollanam-do, graduated from Yonsei University Law School, and passed the bar exam in 1990.
Afterwards, he began his career as a judge at the Suwon District Court, worked as a professor at the Judicial Research and Training Institute, and worked at the Seoul Central District Court.
Chief Judge Koo, who has worked at the Seoul High Court since 2019, acquitted former Blue House Chief of Staff Lee Byeong-ki and former Blue House Senior Secretary for Political Affairs Cho Yoon-seon, who were indicted on charges of interfering with the activities of the Sewol Special Investigation Committee in 2020, not guilty in the appeal trial.
In 2023, the first trial overturned the damages lawsuit filed by Japanese military comfort women victims against the Japanese government and ruled that the Japanese government must compensate the victims 200 million won per person.
In 2024, the application to suspend the Yoon Seok-yeol government's medical school expansion was rejected and pointed out that "doctors' strikes to oppose government policies are in themselves undesirable."
In February of this year, after moving to the 7th Criminal Division, a court dedicated to elections, Chief Judge Koo began to take charge of cases of politicians of great social interest, including the case of Mayor Oh Se-hoon.
A representative case is the violation of the Political Fund Act by former President Yoon Seok-yeol, who was indicted on charges of receiving public opinion polls free of charge from political broker Myung Tae-gyun.
On the 7th, Chief Judge Koo overturned the first trial's guilty verdict and found former President Yoon not guilty.
The first trial determined that former President Yoon received financial benefits equivalent to the cost of the public opinion poll, but Chief Judge Koo evaluated the assistance provided by Myung as political benefit and ruled that the charge of violating the Political Fund Act did not apply.
In addition, it was determined that there was insufficient evidence to conclude that there was an agreement between former President Yoon and his wife and Mr. Myeong to provide free public opinion polls.
Prior to the appeals court ruling, the bail request of Mr. Myeong, who was detained immediately after the first trial verdict, was accepted.
Last September, Mr. Kang, the founder of Genencell, who was involved in the 'suspicion of solicitation of new drugs' by former Justice Minister candidate Kim Seung-won, was sentenced to four years in prison and a fine of 40 million won, which is heavier than the first trial, and was detained in court.
In his ruling, Chief Judge Koo said, "Kim Seung-won cooperated while knowing that the development of new drugs was related to enormous financial gain," and ruled that former candidate Kim's request from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety to approve clinical trials for COVID-19 treatment at the request of broker Yang was a solicitation.
Until recently, Chief Judge Koo attracted attention as he simultaneously tried cases involving former President Yoon and Mayor Oh violating the political fund law.
Both cases were related to Mr. Myeong, but while former President Yoon's case involved charges of receiving public opinion polls for free, the issue in Mayor Oh's case was whether the sponsor was involved in paying for the poll costs.
Chief Judge Koo also showed a proactive attitude by directly asking questions to Mr. Myeong, who appeared as a witness in Mayor Oh's trial.
At the trial last August, when Myeong continued to explain things that deviated from the purpose of the question, he was firmly stopped, saying, "I told you several times not to talk like that," "Please concentrate," and "Please speak briefly."
On this day, the 7th Criminal Division of the Seoul High Court found Mayor Oh not guilty, saying that it was difficult to recognize the credibility of Myung's statement and that there was insufficient objective evidence to support it.
The court emphasized, "If the prosecutor's proof is not sufficient to convince, even if some of the defendant's claims or excuses are unclear and raise suspicions of guilt, the defendant's interests must ultimately be judged. This is a general principle of criminal law to prevent anyone from being unfairly punished."
