Former Woori Financial Group Chairman Son Tae-seung has been found by prosecutors to have ignored multiple internal reports during his tenure urging him to caution his brother-in-law, who was acting as a loan broker. Prosecutors also reported that Son instructed a businessman with strong political connections, introduced through his brother-in-law, to issue bad loans in an attempt to solicit his reappointment as chairman of Woori Financial Group.
According to the indictment of former Chairman Son submitted by the Ministry of Justice to the National Assembly on the 12th, prosecutors have determined that Son received multiple internal reports from internal officials from 2018 to 2022 urging him to 'warn his brother-in-law.'
After taking office as president of Woori Bank in 2017, Son held both the positions of chairman of Woori Financial Group and president of Woori Bank when Woori Financial Group was launched in January 2019. He served as chairman of the holding company from March 2020 to March 2023.
Beginning in August 2018, when Woori Bank auditor A reported that 'there are rumors that the brother-in-law is acting as a loan broker for Woori Bank, so it would be good to caution him,' Son received similar reports from the union chairman of Woori Bank in 2020-2021, and from the head of the public relations brand group and the vice president of the credit group of Woori Bank in 2022. However, prosecutors found that he did not take any action.
Prosecutors believe that since 2014, Son had a close economic relationship with his brother-in-law, purchasing real estate together, and that Son received real estate introductions through his brother-in-law to gain capital gains.
Prosecutors also reported that Son instructed a $10 million corporate working capital loan for businessman B, introduced by his brother-in-law in 2022. B is a well-connected individual in the political community, and it is believed that Son summoned the head of the credit support group at the bank at the time, saying, 'Make sure to review the loan for Chairman B,' with the intention of soliciting his reappointment as chairman of Woori Financial Group. Despite B's company being a real estate firm in a state of capital erosion and uncertain debt repayment ability, Woori Bank executed the loan, prosecutors stated.
According to prosecutors, Son transferred Woori Bank employees who helped his brother-in-law with loans to key positions, during which he ignored opposition from the bank's president. In December of that year, when Son asked that his brother-in-law's friend, C, who was the sales group head of Woori Bank's Sindorim Financial Center, be sent to be the head of the Seolleung Financial Center, he reportedly instructed then-president Kwon of Woori Bank to do so. The president at the time expressed concerns, mentioning that C had low internal evaluation scores and a disciplinary history, saying, 'How can we promote someone of such low quality as a department head? I cannot sign this; reconsider.'
Nevertheless, former Chairman Son reportedly directed C's promotion again and, when the bank president refused, remarked to another employee, 'Who does he think he is to talk about whether or not it happens, how arrogant.' Prosecutors stated that the bank president had no choice but to promote C to department head and assign him to the Seolleung Financial Center.
Meanwhile, the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors' Office indicted former Chairman Son on charges of breach of trust and obstruction of duty without detention on the 21st of last month. According to prosecutors, Son is accused of providing a total of 51.7 billion won in illegal loans through 23 transactions to companies operated by his brother-in-law Kim from September 2021 to August 2023. At the first trial held the previous day at the Seoul Southern District Court, Son did not disclose whether he acknowledged the charges.