Trampling the Chief Prosecutor (3)
When I clearly declared that I was rejecting his proposal, Jin Yong-hwa shook his head as though it were utterly inconceivable and added one more line.
“Do you know who my father is?”
Oh, how childish. When “Do you know who I am?” fails, he falls back on “Do you know who my dad is?” I couldn’t tell whether I was standing inside a prosecutor’s office or had wandered into a middle-school classroom during recess.
Jin Yong-hwa had apparently spent his entire life flashing his prosecutor’s badge first, then brandishing his National Assemblyman father’s name whenever that didn’t work. He must have believed every problem could be solved that way. Did he really think it would work on me?
Thanks to his unnecessary remark, I added one more item to my list of resolutions: I would crush not only Jin Yong-hwa but Jin Myeong-deok as well.
I answered his arrogant question with one of my own.
“Is Assemblyman Jin Myeong-deok, your esteemed father, doing well? I only ever see his name in the news. Word is he won’t receive the nomination for his current district in the upcoming general election. If it comes out that his prosecutor son recklessly indicted someone without evidence and dragged the suspect in for questioning, that would give him quite the headache, wouldn’t it?”
Jin Yong-hwa sucked in a sharp breath and held it, unable to exhale for a moment. Finally he managed to speak.
“So you’re planning to make an enemy of my father as well, just because I’m not enough?”
I hadn’t made them my enemies. The Jin father and son had already chosen a path that ran directly opposite to mine. They wanted to become the in-laws of the JB family; there was never any chance they could get along with QS.
“I don’t run from anyone who insists on fighting me. Whether they’re prosecutors or members of the National Assembly, I have no intention of losing.”
“Understood. Since you clearly have no intention of stepping away from the criminal-organization-formation case, I’ll consider negotiations broken down. You may leave. As for the Daebong Bio matter, we’ll schedule your next summons once the investigation progresses.”
Really? He still didn’t realize his own capabilities weren’t even close to being a match for me? And the Daebong Bio case he was so eager to pursue was just as baseless as the old QS Display wastewater-discharge incident.
“Do as you please. Just make sure you’re prepared for the backlash.”
After leaving Jin Yong-hwa’s office, I took the pen I had tucked into my shirt pocket and slipped it into my trouser pocket. Jin Yong-hwa hadn’t the faintest idea what it was.
* * *
With my business at the prosecutor’s office concluded, I headed for the complaints desk in the main lobby. I had chosen the Southern District Prosecutors’ Office as today’s destination because Jin Yong-hwa was not the only person I needed to meet here.
After drawing a number and waiting my turn, I approached the staff member at the desk.
“I’d like to see Prosecutor Park Geun-beom.”
Prosecutor Park Geun-beom was the author of the approval document that had appeared before my eyes earlier—the very person inside the prosecution who had recommended non-indictment in Seok Dong-hoon’s case.
“Pardon? I’m afraid meetings with prosecutors are only granted according to pre-arranged schedules. It won’t be possible right now.”
Plenty of people wanted direct access to prosecutors who held the exclusive power to indict. Most were either complainants demanding indictment or suspects begging for charges to be dropped. Realistically, no prosecutor could meet every single one of them, so the existence of a standard response protocol at the complaints desk was understandable.
But that rule applied only when I was an ordinary citizen.
“I’m the defense attorney for the case Prosecutor Park investigated. Could you ask whether he’s willing to meet me? Just a moment.”
After I provided the case number for Seok Dong-hoon’s matter, the staff member finished the call and nodded.
“Prosecutor Park Geun-beom says he can make time. He’ll be down shortly.”
Exactly as promised, Park Geun-beom appeared and led me to an empty conference room inside the building.
“I thought it would be inappropriate to discuss case details at the complaints desk, so I brought you here. I hope that’s all right.”
“The location doesn’t matter. What matters is the person I’m speaking with.”
“Thank you. You’re the attorney representing the defendant in the criminal-organization-formation case I investigated?”
“That’s correct.”
At my answer, Park Geun-beom looked puzzled.
“I handed the investigation results over to Chief Prosecutor Jin Yong-hwa and stepped away completely. Honestly, I was so certain no crime had been committed that I didn’t even summon the suspect, Seok Dong-hoon, for questioning. My name isn’t on the indictment, so how did you know I was the investigating prosecutor?”
Well, because the document that had appeared before my eyes had listed Prosecutor Park Geun-beom as the sender. Of course, I had no intention of saying that to his face.
“Allow me to introduce myself first. My name is Kwon Ho-gyun. Aside from representing Mr. Seok Dong-hoon, I’ve been involved in various other matters and happened to hear about it.”
Park Geun-beom silently repeated my name a few times, then his eyes widened and he bowed his head.
“The Kwon Ho-gyun, the attorney from the QS Group? My goodness, I completely failed to recognize you. I’m terribly sorry.”
“Not at all. Right now I’m simply here as an attorney to meet the prosecutor who handled my client’s case. There’s no need to be formal. That said, I still can’t understand why Seok Dong-hoon was even named a suspect in the first place.”
“I share that view. The matter should have ended with punishing the assailant, Go Jung-gu, and the instigator who was arrested first. Things only went sideways after Chief Prosecutor Jin Yong-hwa asked for the investigation files.”
“Went sideways?”
Park Geun-beom let out a long sigh before continuing.
“Yes. Chief Prosecutor Jin suddenly sent the assailant’s phone for digital forensics and then ordered every single person who had any criminal conversation with him to be registered as a suspect. When I asked what charges could possibly apply, he said criminal organization formation.”
“That charge isn’t so easily applied, is it?”
“As expected, talking to a lawyer makes things move quickly. I suggested we use those conversations as leads and only arrest people once actual crimes occurred. But Chief Prosecutor Jin insisted we register everyone immediately, and several of them were actually indicted.”
Even I, who had once been a prosecutor, knew that working under a chief like that would be hell for any junior prosecutor. In an organization as rigidly hierarchical as the prosecution, when a superior simply steamrolls over a subordinate’s correct opinion, the junior has no choice but to stay silent.
“That must have been frustrating.”
My sympathetic remark prompted Park Geun-beom to unload everything he had been holding back.
“It was driving me insane. Once the suspects were identified, we could have caught them all with proper investigation. Because of Chief Prosecutor Jin, we’re about to lose every single one of them. So I asked to have my name removed from the case entirely. I wanted it on record that I opposed it.”
While listening carefully, I noticed a recurring pattern in his words. He kept referring to Jin Yong-hwa simply as “Chief Prosecutor Jin” rather than using the more respectful “Chief Prosecutor Jin Yong-hwa.” That spoke volumes about his personal animosity.
“Does Chief Prosecutor Jin Yong-hwa always handle cases so arbitrarily?”
“Don’t even get me started. He acts like he owns the place just because his father is a former chief prosecutor turned assemblyman. Not long ago he even dragged the deputy chief prosecutor into it and pulled the Daeung Bio case into our department. It’s been a nightmare. Since when does the criminal division handle economic crimes?”
“If that’s how he operates, I imagine many other prosecutors dislike him as well.”
“Everyone’s sick of him constantly pulling rank with his seniority. This isn’t the 1980s anymore. And it’s even worse for me—he treats me like a trainee even though I’m already in my third year as a prosecutor, all because I graduated from law school.”
A “trainee” period referred to the practical training phase before being given real responsibilities. If what he said was true, Jin Yong-hwa was treating a fully qualified prosecutor like Park Geun-beom as nothing more than a student.
“I also graduated from law school. Listening to this is starting to make me angry.”
“Ah, so you’re a law-school graduate as well. A pleasure. If you ever run into Chief Prosecutor Jin and he starts going on about training-center seniority, just ignore him. He’s so bad that even our chief prosecutor once joked about putting him on the ‘seniority-excluded’ list.”
Watching the usually serious Park Geun-beom turn into a chatterbox, I judged the moment right to ask what I really wanted to know.
“Would you be interested in giving Chief Prosecutor Jin a proper taste of his own medicine?”
“Pardon? If there’s any way I can, of course I would. Do you know how much I’ve suffered under him?”
“The first trial date for the criminal-organization-formation case involving the defendant Seok Dong-hoon is coming up soon. As his defense counsel, I’ll naturally be present. Would you be willing to appear as a witness at that hearing?”
Park Geun-beom, who had been speaking so fluently moments earlier, paused for a beat, visibly startled.
“Well… I’d like to, but there’s the principle of prosecutorial unity, and personnel evaluations are coming up soon.”
The principle of prosecutorial unity. It existed, all right. In short, it meant every prosecutor was supposed to move as one organic body. However—
“The principle of prosecutorial unity has already been abolished. Under the newly enacted Prosecutors’ Office Act, even a subordinate can raise objections to a superior’s directives. And testifying to one’s own conscientious interpretation of the law should take precedence over something like prosecutorial unity, wouldn’t you agree?”
“That’s true.”
“You also mentioned personnel evaluations are coming up. Are you really going to let Chief Prosecutor Jin, who treats you like an insect just because you went to law school, write your evaluation?”
“Th-that’s…”
“Between a chief prosecutor so ostracized that even the prosecution itself is talking about excluding him from seniority, and the head of QS Group’s Central Management Headquarters, which one do you think will be more helpful to your future?”
Only then did Park Geun-beom seem to realize what he had been overlooking. He nodded firmly.
“I’ll appear as a witness at the trial.”
* * *
Four days after I entered the Southern District Prosecutors’ Office and clearly distinguished friend from foe, Seok Dong-hoon’s first trial began.
In an ordinary criminal trial, the prosecution usually sat with an air of confidence while the defendant and defense counsel remained tense. Today, however, the atmosphere was completely reversed.
While Prosecutor Jin Yong-hwa fidgeted restlessly at the prosecution’s table, glancing around nervously, Seok Dong-hoon and I sat across from him in the defense and defendant seats, staring him down.
In this very atmosphere, today’s hearing would not be a trial of Seok Dong-hoon—it would be a trial of Jin Yong-hwa himself.