KOR
▲ Former Presidential Secretary for General Affairs Yoon Jae-soon, who is accused of illegally diverting budgets during the relocation of the presidential residence under the Yoon Suk Yeol administration, leaves the Seoul Central District Court in Seocho-gu, Seoul, after a pre-trial detention hearing (warrant review) on May 22.
Former Presidential Secretary for General Affairs Yoon Jae-soon, who was indicted and detained on charges of ordering the illegal diversion of budgets during the relocation of former President Yoon Suk Yeol's official residence, has requested a trial without detention.
Yoon filed a request for bail (release under conditions such as a deposit) with the 36th Criminal Settlement Division of the Seoul Central District Court (Presiding Judge Lee Jung-yeop), the court handling his first-instance trial, on July 27.
The hearing date has been set for September 4.
Yoon is currently standing trial alongside former Presidential Chief of Staff Kim Dae-ki, former Presidential Secretary for Facility Management Kim Oh-jin, and former Interior Minister Lee Sang-min on charges including abuse of authority to obstruct the exercise of rights.
They are accused of illegally diverting and executing 2.09 billion won from the Ministry of the Interior and Safety budget, unrelated to official residence operations, in order to pay construction costs to 21gram—an unqualified company with ties to Kim Keon-hee—during the presidential residence relocation construction in 2022.
At the time, the budget allocated under the category of interior remodeling for the residence relocation was 1.44 billion won, but 21gram, the company that actually took charge of the construction, submitted an interior cost estimate of approximately 4.12 billion won.
Although the cost estimate came out to three times the initial plan, investigations showed that the presidential office proceeded with the construction without any verification or adjustment.
The 2nd Independent Special Prosecutor Team led by Kwon Chang-young believes that the presidential office under the Yoon Suk Yeol administration pressured the Ministry of the Interior and Safety to illegally execute the budget to cover the increased construction costs.
Former Chief of Staff Kim, who was detained along with Yoon, also filed for bail with the court in July, but the court dismissed it citing concerns over the destruction of evidence.
(Photo: Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.
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