Former Supreme Court Chief Justice Yang Sung-tae Speaks Out with a Court Statement (Full Text)

2019-5-31, statement by former Supreme Court Chief Justice Yang Seung-tae (양승태), via PennMike

Of course I want to tell you how miserable I feel as I stand in court, but since I don’t have much time, I will skip it and just tell you briefly about this case.

More than 80 prosecutors were mobilized to conduct an investigation for over eight months to create a charging document that is over 300 pages.

I have been working in the judiciary for 42 years, but I have never seen such a complaint document before.

Many fellow legal professionals visited me.  They read the charging document, and they all ask how can there be such [an absurd] complaint document?

The complaint document is a creation and a novel

Rather than being a legal document written by a lawyer, it seems to me that a novelist wrote it with poor legal advice.  There are so many holes and flaws in terms of the law that it has turned the entire charging document into an illegal complaint.   It can be verified from multiple places [in the document] that [the prosecutors] really do not know the most important aspects in dealing with this case, such as the court’s trial procedures or judge’s positions.

The Prosecutors’ writings show they do not know about trials

This complaint’s first phrase begins with a bombastic argument, as if the accused conducted an act of monstrous treason.

They weaved a story that I made all kinds of deals through trials, scheming to make deals that are [in reality] impossible.  They made a plot by distorting everything, using sophistry and imagination. In the last section, where the fact of the charges should be summarized, there is no longer the topic of deal making during trials, but concludes with getting the subordinate directors to draft a few documents and reports as “abuse of authority.”  When I tell various jurists who visit me that such is the charge, many are surprised.

Turning report writing into a trial dealing

They have caused a stir in this country by claiming that (having them write) the report is an abuse of authority and that I made deals during trials.  So many people believed the narrative, but the investigation revealed there is nothing about deals during trials.

They took an easy court case and packaged it as if there were deals, but there was not much trace of interfering [dealing] in a trial.

In the end, the conclusion was that a report was drafted.

The terms “TaeSanMyeongDongSeoIlPil” [(“태산명동서일필(泰山鳴動鼠一匹)] precisely describes this case.  [“TaeSanMyeongDongSeoIlpil” means it began as if a large mountain would move, but in reality, it yielded a mouse–so it began as if it were something big, but in reality, it was nothing special.] This is the worst case of Yongdoosami [용두사미(龍頭蛇尾)]. [“Yondoosami” means two dragon heads, but has a snake’s tail–so it seemed like it was something important, but in the end, not.] They tried to draw dragons, but couldn’t even draw a snake.

The same with [their accusations of] the blacklist [during Park Geun-hye’s impeachment].  They caused a raucousness [in Korea] with [the accusation that the Park administration made a blacklist [of artists], but when it was revealed that there was no such list, they claimed that a general personnel document was a blacklist.

Such packaging overflows in the 300-page complaint document.  [In the complaint,] there are quite a few products that took insignificant contents in our society, but packaged them marvelously.  Such packaging misleads consumers, and this situation is such a case.

In the end, it is clear that by packaging a trifle splendidly, [the prosecutors] intend to create, on the part of the court, a very negative prejudice and prejudgement.

The intent to illicit prejudice and prejudgement from judges

Given such a novelistic tendency, it may not be surprising that [the prosecutors] had not considered the legality that much.  There’s hardly anything related to actual legal codes. Since they approached it like a novel, there are numerous weaknesses.  I will show you a very specific example, in which the fact of the charges are not even identified properly.

No identification of the facts of the charges, they appear as “etc.” in various places

I’ll quote one sentence in the charging document–“[he] made them do meaningless work, such as getting the Human Resources Director Bae OO (배OO), to draft that content into a report, etc.” or “[he] made the Human Resources Director Bae OO (배OO), etc. do meaningless work, such as drafting that content into a report.” [The way it is written in Korean, it could be construed both ways.]   “etc.” is an indefinite word for two or more. It could mean, two or three or 10. If it is “Bae OO, etc.” in this document, it means at least two people. If it is “make [him/her] draft a report, etc.,” then it means at least two [tasks]. The sentence contains at least four acts.

There is, however, only one item that can be known.  Then what are the other three? What [exactly] should we defend and what should the judge hear?  It is like a case when a boxer is blind folded, and two or three people from the other side hit the blindfolded boxer in a match.

Accusing many as accomplices despite no activity nor execution

It is written as if almost everyone in this case are accomplices.  The document does not show any acts carried out, even by those specifically marked as accomplices.

And it brazenly included events that occurred after the charged acts as well as a completely unrelated trial.

Completely ignoring trial procedures

If it were a novel, I can understand that perhaps they were writing an epilogue and anecdotes to make the story line more interesting, but each [embellishment] makes the complaints illegal.

180,000 pages of investigative reports?  All peppered with speculative statements

In such a situation, the prosecutors are urging a hearing soon. The defendant or the lawyer do not know exactly what to defend, yet [the prosecutors] want a hearing.  It is the same as saying let’s play soccer match without marking the center line and the goal posts. Because of the lengthy documents and because I’m already imprisoned, I have been able to see less than 1/100 of the 180,000-page investigative reports.

Even from the parts of the investigative reports I’ve seen, I’m surprised by numerous items.

Numerous leading interrogations

I reviewed some testimonies and documentary investigation reports, and they are filled with speculative statements, rather than actual facts that they directly experienced.

The [speculative] statements are not made voluntarily.  Since most of the statements accommodate clever leading questions, we can fully sense that, although they did not directly experience [what they were questioned about], they could not withstand the continuous pressure from the prosecutors’ demands to provide their opinions.

Be on guard for prosecutors’ investigations

Those who have not been questioned by prosecutors may not realize, but as I am going through the prosecutors’ questioning myself for the first time, it struck me to really be careful in reading the prosecutor’s report.  There are too many instances in which they fill out the report with contents totally different from [the questioned person’s] answers, because of their use of cleverly worded questions.

I think this investigation is really unfortunate, but I [have now] experienced first hand how careful every jurist must be of a prosecutors’ report of an investigated person.

They went through everything from day 1 to [my] final day [as a Chief Justice]

I guessed some of the extent of the speculative comments [in the prosecutors’ documents], but I was surprised when I actually saw it.  It is not a normal investigation. I saw that they combed through all my activities from the first day of my appointment to my last day [as Chief Justice] in order to find anything out of step with the law.  I was surprised that they investigated even minor items. I even found traces of them rummaging through events under my predecessor at the Supreme Court.

Not an investigation, but an inspection; this is the abuse of authority

Is this really an investigation?  This is an inspection.

What is the purpose of this inspection?  They must punish a specified person, so the inspection is to find something to punish the person with.

The Republic of Korea is a democracy and a republic of the rule of law.

A rule of law society is one in which the laws protect the citizens and the existence of the laws guarantee the safety of the citizens.  The investigative authorities or the prosecutors conduct investigations and prosecutions in order to protect and defend the rule of law for the citizens.

Investigations that are not for that purpose, but are to find someone to punish, and to find justifications to punish that person, destroy the rule of law.  Such investigations directly violate the constitution and are a [gross] abuse of authority.

This investigation of the judiciary is unprecedented in the world

(truncated) They conducted such an inspection of the judiciary.  How can our country that is based on the separation of powers pursue such a cruel investigation?

If we have reached a situation in which they can conduct such investigations of the judiciary, then what will stop them from doing the same to any citizen of the Republic of Korea?

If this kind of investigation is permitted, then no citizen is safe.

An effective weapon called “abuse of authority”

They developed an effective weapon called the “abuse of authority” in this process. [truncated]

I read a book on French history, which stated “there is no country as miserable as the one that submits itself to a hateful power due to fear.”

A wretched country that submits due to fear

Will the Republic of Korea really be ruled by the law and the law keenly protect the people so it is maintained as a liberal democracy that enjoys peace and prosperity?  Or will it be a prosecutors’ republic in which people tremble in fear of the almighty sword of the prosecutors? I think that several ongoing trials will determine the fate of this country.

I’d like to say one more thing.  A poet I admire who passed away last year wrote in <One Maeum [mind/heart]> “Long ago, the strongest man on earth could lift and put down everything in the world, but no matter what, there was one thing he could not move:  the shapeless, colorless, odorless, weightless Maeum.”

Numerous people who must endure only with Maeum

Recently, I have endured these kinds of attacks against me and a few other people [in this case]. But I realize there are many more who must also endure with Maeum alone.

I hope that the court will observe the various problems in this case, and conduct appropriate and powerful litigation so that the defendants can have peace of mind.  Thank you for listening so long.

Source:  https://www.pennmike.com/news/articleView.html?idxno=19345