Supreme Court Acquits President Yoon’s Mother-in-law of Receiving Illegal Health Insurance Benefits

President Yoon Suk-yeol’s mother-in-law Choi Eun-soon. Yonhap News

The Supreme Court acquitted President Yoon Suk-yeol’s mother-in-law, Choi Eun-soon, of receiving illegal health insurance benefits. Although Choi’s explanation left room for suspicion, the court claimed that the prosecutors failed to clearly prove the charges.

On December 15, the second petty bench (chief justice Lee Dong-won) of the Supreme Court finalized the lower court ruling and acquitted Choi. The court declared her not guilty of violating the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes (fraud) and the Medical Service Act.

Choi founded a medical foundation with three other partners in February 2013 and opened and operated a care hospital without a medical license. Choi was tried after the National Health Insurance Service filed a report against her claiming that she wrongfully received nearly 3 billion won in health insurance benefits.

Choi was one of the parties who signed a sales contract for the building that was later used as the care hospital in 2013. She paid a down payment of 200 million won, and she also signed necessary documents as the chairperson of the board in the process of establishing the medical foundation, which oversaw the hospital.

Choi appointed her son-in-law (married to her eldest daughter) as the administrator of the hospital for some time and provided some of the hospital’s operation costs. When the foundation took out a loan of nearly 1.7 billion won to expand the hospital, she even put up her own real estate as collateral.

Her three partners were put on trial for this in 2015 and were sentenced to imprisonment and stay of execution. But Choi was not prosecuted. Reportedly, she received a memorandum releasing her from any responsibility for the management of the hospital when she stepped down as chairperson in 2014.

Then in 2020, the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office prosecuted Choi for violating the Medical Service Act and the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes (fraud). In the first trial, the court decided that Choi was actively involved in the establishment and operation of the care hospital and sentenced her to three years in prison and arrested her in the courtroom.

But in the second trial, the bench acquitted Choi. The court saw Choi as an investor, not a person who managed the hospital. Since this meant that she was not an accomplice in the illegal opening of the hospital, she was not guilty of fraud--deceiving the National Health Insurance Service and receiving illegal health insurance benefits.

The Supreme Court finalized the second ruling. The court explained, “When the prosecutors cannot prove the charges beyond a reasonable doubt, the court must rule in favor of the defendant despite lingering suspicions due to contradictions and uncertainty in the defendant’s argument.”