The Supreme Court has postponed the final ruling on the appeal of former President Yoon Suk Yeol's spouse, Kim Keon-hee, regarding allegations including her involvement in the Deutsch Motors stock manipulation scandal, which was originally scheduled for tomorrow, and decided to refer the case to the full bench.

The Supreme Court announced this afternoon (July 23) that "the sentencing date for the case involving defendant Kim Keon-hee on charges including violations of the Capital Markets Act has been changed and postponed (to be designated later) for referral to the full bench."

The ruling was initially scheduled for 2:00 p.m. tomorrow under the deliberation of Supreme Court Division 2 (Presiding Justice Kwon Young-jun, Justice Park Young-jae as the justice in charge), but the decision to refer the case to the full bench was made just a day prior.

A case is sent to the full bench when a petty bench consisting of four justices fails to reach a unanimous agreement or when it is deemed inappropriate for the petty bench to adjudicate.

While the Supreme Court did not disclose the specific reason for the full bench referral, interpretations suggest that consecutive rulings from lower courts containing contradictory judgments regarding the "Myung Tae-kyun opinion poll" allegations compared to Kim's lower court verdicts may have influenced the decision.

Kim was previously acquitted in her first and second trials regarding allegations of receiving free opinion polls from Myung Tae-kyun.

However, former President Yoon, who was separately indicted on the same charges, was partially convicted in his first trial.

Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon, who was indicted on charges of receiving opinion polls from Myung Tae-kyun and having a supporter pay for the costs on his behalf, was also sentenced to guilty in his first trial the previous day.

Unlike Kim's first and second trials, the first-instance court for Mayor Oh's case partially recognized the credibility of Myung's statements.