Opposition spreads as police exclude former Marine division commander from subject of prosecution’s investigation

Former Marine Corps 1st Division commander Lim Sung-keun leaves the Gyeongbuk National Police Agency on May 14 after an overnight investigation into the death of Marine Corporal Chae Su-geun. Yonhap News Agency

The opposition is spreading after the Gyeongbuk National Police Agency, which investigated the death of Marine Corporal Chae Su-geun, decided to exclude former Marine Corps 1st Division commander Lim Sung-keun from the list of people subjected to the prosecution’s investigation at the Investigation Review Committee held on July 5. Chae's battalion commander filed a complaint against Lim and the head of the Gyeongbuk Provincial Police Agency to the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO). If the outcome of the Investigation Review Committee is upheld in an announcement of the police investigation results scheduled for the 8th, it will raise criticism that President Yoon Suk-yeol's alleged external pressure to exclude Lim from the investigation will be realized.

On June 6, lawyer Kim Kyung-ho, a legal agent of Lieutenant Colonel Lee Yong-min, who was the commander of Chae’s battalion unit, filed a complaint against Lim with the CIO on charges of abuse of office and professional negligence resulting in the death. It is argued Lim is a general-level officer that the CIO has jurisdiction over his investigation, so the CIO should investigate, not the police. On July 7, Kim filed a complaint against Gyeongbuk National Police Chief Kim Chul-moon on charges of abuse of authority, saying, "The Gyeongbuk National Police Chief opened the investigation committee even though he was not allowed to hold it ex officio and gave Lim immunity." The Gyeongbuk National Police held the investigation review committee on the 5th and reportedly concluded that it was difficult to recognize the charges of professional negligence manslaughter against Lim and three other officers, including two junior officers.

The Marine Corps Investigation Team, which first investigated the death of Corporal Chae last year, suspected eight people, including Lim, of professional negligence and tried to transfer the case records to the police with the approval of then-Minister of Defense Lee Jong-sup. However, the transferred records were recovered by military authorities. During this process, it was confirmed that there were frequent phone calls between military authorities and officials from the presidential office.

Park Jung-hoon, former head of the Marine Corps Investigation Team, claimed, "The transfer was canceled after the presidential office and the command of the Ministry of National Defense pressured in all directions after President Yoon raged, 'Who can be the head of the division if a division commander is punished for something like this?’”

In an interim report, the investigation headquarters pointed out that Lim did not establish safety measures for personnel entering the underwater search site and did not specify a specific search method, which led to the death of Corporal Chae, who wore boots to conduct the underwater search.

If the police exclude Lim from the list of people subjected to the prosecution’s investigation when announcing the results of the investigation on the 8th, it will be necessary to explain as it contradicts with the earlier result of the Marine Corps Investigation Team and the interim report of the Defense Ministry's investigation headquarters. This could lead to suspicion and criticism that the police were in fact following Yoon's "guidelines.”

Political parties are also raising their voices. The main opposition Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) called on Yoon to adopt a bill mandating a special counsel investigation into the death of Marine Corporal Chae, which was recently passed at the National Assembly's plenary session, saying that "despite numerous evidence and circumstances, the police gave the former division commander Lim immunity."

※This article has undergone review by a professional translator after being translated by an AI translation tool.