The court will announce the verdict on the appeal for the public office election law violation case of Lee Jae-myung, the leader of the Democratic Party, at 2 p.m. on the 26th. Previously, in the first trial, Lee was sentenced to one year in prison with a two-year probation.
If the same sentence is handed down in the appeal and confirmed by the Supreme Court, Lee will be deprived of the right to run for office for 10 years. Additionally, the Democratic Party must return more than 43.4 billion won, which it was reimbursed as election expense for the last presidential election, to the National Election Commission.
On this day, the 6-2 Criminal Division of the Seoul High Court (Director General Choi Eun-jung, Lee Ye-seul, and Jeong Jae-oh) will hold the sentencing date for Lee's public office election law violation case. This is about two years and six months after he was indicted in September 2022. The appeal decision will take place four months after the first trial sentence.
Lee was indicted for allegedly making false statements regarding the Daejang-dong project during a broadcast and the Gyeonggi Province audit in 2021, ahead of the 20th presidential election.
The problematic statements are largely threefold. ▲ He claimed that a photo of him playing golf with the late Kim Moon-ki, who was a practitioner in the Daejang-dong development project, during a 2015 overseas business trip was manipulated. ▲ He said the site in Baekhyeon-dong was changed due to pressure from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. ▲ He claimed he did not know Kim Moon-ki.
The first trial previously judged that Lee intentionally lied in his statements regarding the overseas business trip golf claim and the Baekhyeon-dong claim, leading to a guilty verdict. The court stated, "The defendant (Lee Jae-myung) played golf with Kim Moon-ki during the overseas business trip, so the golf statement is false and the intent of making a false statement is acknowledged." It also noted, "The change in the Baekhyeon-dong site was not made reluctantly due to the Ministry's request but was something (Lee) reviewed and changed himself."
Lee's defense team denied the allegations during the second trial process, stating that the essence of Lee's remarks was merely that 'he did not know (Kim Moon-ki) during his term as Mayor of Seongnam.' The claim regarding Lee playing golf relates to the assertion that the photo of the golf session was manipulated, not whether he actually played golf.
The critical issue is whether the appeal court will view Lee's statements as false and whether they were made intentionally. During the trial process, the appeal court requested the prosecution to specify what false statements each of Lee's remarks contained, which was actually done.
Meanwhile, even if the appeal verdict is announced on this day, it does not mean that Lee's verdict is final. There is a high likelihood that the prosecution and Lee's side will appeal. The public office election law mandates that the first trial concludes within six months, and that the second and third trials be completed within three months each. However, considering the deadlines for filing appeals and the delivery times, it is not expected that the Supreme Court will reach a final verdict by June.