On the first day of early voting for the 21st presidential election, an election worker accused of proxy voting in her husband's name was arrested by police on 1st.
Presiding Judge Yeom Hye-soo of the Seoul Central District Court conducted a pre-arrest interrogation (substantive examination of the warrant) for a person surnamed Park, who is charged with violating the Public Official Election Act, and issued a warrant.
Judge Yeom noted, "There is concern about evidence destruction and flight."
Park is accused of issuing a ballot using her husband's identification at an early voting site in Daechi 2-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, on the first day of early voting on 29th of last month, and of voting with her own identification about five hours later.
Park is reported to be a contractual employee of the health center in Gangnam-gu, Seoul. She was appointed as an election worker ahead of this presidential election and was responsible for issuing ballots to voters.
Police responded on 29th of last month at around 5:11 p.m. after receiving a report from an independent observer for independent presidential candidate Hwang Kyo-ahn, who stated that "there is a voter who voted twice," and urgently arrested A.
While going to the detention review that day, Park told reporters, "I made a wrong choice in the moment," and said, "My husband doesn’t know." When asked by reporters, 'Why did you do proxy voting?' she said, "I'm sorry." Regarding the question, 'Did you plan this crime in advance?' she responded, "Not at all. I made a wrong choice in the moment."
Park left after completing her detention review at around 2:49 p.m. that day. When reporters asked, 'Does your husband know about the proxy voting?' she replied, "He doesn't know at all."