Tag: Kim Hye-kyung

Charges of libel from Twitter messages from the wife of Gyeongi province Governor Lee Jae-myung have been dropped, but it appears unsurprisingly that Governor Lee was the primary target of the prosecutors all along: 

Gyeonggi Province Gov. Lee Jae-myung will stand trial for telling falsehoods about a series of allegations raised against him and about his family during his election campaign for the governorship. 
The Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office indicted Lee without physical detention on charges of violating the national election law, it said.
Lee has been under investigation for allegedly lying about his brother’s institutionalization due to a mental illness during his campaign in the runup to the June local elections. 
He denied when he appeared on TV debates as a governor candidate that he had used his authority as the then Seongnam mayor to have his now-deceased brother institutionalized against his will.
The governor also faced accusations after an actress claimed she had an extramarital affair with Lee. Prosecutors decided to not press any charges against Lee, citing insufficient grounds.
“It’s what I expected. I’m not baffled,” he told reporters following the prosecution announcement.
Lee also hinted that he would not give up his seat over the indictment and will fight the matter in court. 
“I still am a proud member of the Democratic Party. I will do my utmost to not cause any more trouble for the party,” he said

You can read more at the link, but Governor Lee was a major rival to current President Moon Jae-in during the last election.  The Moon administration has effectively eliminated him now as a future political rival. 

Here is the latest on the Moon administration’s attempt to take out another political rival using South Korea libel laws:

Prosecutors summoned the wife of Gyeonggi Gov. Lee Jae-myung for questioning on Tuesday over allegations that she defamed her husband’s political rivals online.

Kim Hye-kyung, who police identified as the owner of the Twitter handle @08_hkkim, told reporters she was tired and frustrated at being wrongly accused as she entered the Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office in Seongnam, Gyeonggi.

“I only hope the truth is revealed,” she said, echoing the words of her husband who underwent his own 13-hour interrogation last week over a number of different criminal accusations.

A police investigation into Kim’s case revealed last month that the @08_hkkim Twitter account posted thousands of political messages supporting Lee and defaming his political rivals. Some of the political figures publicly defamed were Rep. Jeon Hae-cheol of the ruling Democratic Party (DP) and President Moon Jae-in.

Prosecutors say that Kim may be charged with spreading false information about Jeon in the run up to the Gyeonggi gubernatorial election in June and smearing the reputation of Moon’s son, Moon Joon-yong, with allegations that he obtained a public sector job through his father’s influence.

Both Kim and the governor deny the accusations, claiming that she never operated the Twitter account.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link, but with a Twitter handle with her named attached to it she obviously wasn’t trying to hide her identity if it was her.  On the other hand it could have been someone else who set up the Twitter handle to set her up.  After all the misinformation we saw over the “discovery” of the PC tablet that brought down President Park, anything is possible.

By the way I do like how the prosecutors are going after Governor Lee Jae-myung, a political rival to President Moon Jae-in than they were after fellow Governor Kim Kyoung-soo for his part in the far worse Druking Scandal.  I have always said South Korea is not a rule of law country, but instead a rule by law country which means it helps to be the President’s close friend in regards to Governor Kim.

The Moon administration continues to go after a political rival using the country’s libel laws:

Prosecutors and investigators from the Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office began the raid on Lee’s home in Seongnam, south of Seoul, at around 9 a.m.

About the same time, another group of prosecutors searched Lee’s office in Suwon in the presence of the governor and his lawyer.

The raid was apparently intended to retrieve an iPhone used by Lee’s wife, Kim Hye-kyung, from July 2016 until April this year, when allegations of her involvement in online slandering of Lee’s election rivals surfaced.