▲ Former Daegu Mayor Hong Joon-pyo arrives at the Daegu District Court on the morning of October 27. Hong attended the court as an attorney for an acquaintance, whose arrest warrant was requested in connection with the "alleged payment of Myung Tae-kyun's opinion poll costs."
Former Daegu Mayor Hong Joon-pyo has urged the police, who are investigating two former election camp officials for alleged illegal political fund expenditures, to investigate him directly instead.
Writing on Facebook today (October 28), Hong stated, "If you are confident, call me in, investigate, and wrap it up."
He continued, "I repeat, stop conducting investigations that target volunteers or hardworking lower-level staff, seeking arrest warrants, and using threats of detention to pressure them."
Hong explained, "Political accounting personnel use slang terms like 'to turl' (to clear or settle) when reconciling campaign expense accounts."
He further claimed, "The police misunderstood such slang found in KakaoTalk messages as fictitious transactions and fabricated their investigation."
Regarding the ongoing police investigation, he called it "pursuing a fictitious delusion," and warned, "When you summon me, make sure you bring actual evidence."
Previously, the Daegu Metropolitan Police Agency has been investigating individuals surnamed Park and Kim since March on charges of illegally spending political funds from Hong's election camp during the 2021 People Power Party presidential primary.
Park, the representative of an election service agency, is accused of conspiring with Kim, who was the camp's accounting manager at the time, to illicitly spend tens of millions of won in political funds.
The two are also suspected of submitting false accounting reports—prepared using forged supporting documents after the presidential primary concluded—to the National Election Commission.
Initially, while investigating the "alleged payment of Myung Tae-kyun's opinion poll costs" triggered by a civic group's complaint, the police newly uncovered circumstances pointing to political fund law violations by Park, one of the accused parties.
Continuing their related investigation, arrest warrants for Park and Kim were requested through the prosecution service.
However, yesterday (October 27), the court dismissed the arrest warrants for both individuals, citing that "it is difficult to view them as posing a risk of flight or destruction of evidence."
The police explained that the statute of limitations for the political fund law violations involving Park and others expires on November 19.
With this dismissal of the arrest warrants, the momentum for investigating whether higher-ups, including former Mayor Hong, were involved has somewhat waned.
Accordingly, the police plan to refer only the two individuals, Park and Kim, to the prosecution service without detention after additional supplementary investigations.
Once the prosecution indicts the two, the police plan to continue their investigation to identify any accomplices.
A police official stated, "Detention is merely one investigative method; the dismissal of a warrant does not mean the investigation is halted."
The official added, "Once Park and others are indicted, the statute of limitations for accomplices is suspended, so we will continue to pursue the investigation."
(Photo: Yonhap News)
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