Civil servant accused of ‘suspicion of misappropriation of legal documents’ ‘non-transferred’… Why?

A public official who was suspected of using business operating budget funds for personal purposes was cleared of charges.

According to the legal community on the 14th, the Gyeonggi Northern Police Agency decided not to forward Mr. A, who was booked on charges of breach of trust, forgery of official documents, and holding events on the 12th of last month.

While working as a public official from February 2017 to June of last year, Mr. A is accused of using a corporate card for personal use worth 2 million won on a total of 33 occasions while carrying out youth-related projects.

They were also charged with forging official documents by arbitrarily putting their seals on them without obtaining approval from the head of the government office or department head while writing an operating business plan for this crime.

Mr. A completely denied the charges, saying that he actually carried out work even on days off such as vacation and childcare time. Mr. A claimed, “When I was on sick leave, after receiving treatment, I returned and held a meeting with other people. In this process, I used the meeting fee, etc., and it cannot be considered illegal use. The seal was also taken after receiving permission after an oral report to the superior.”

The police believed there was insufficient evidence to admit Mr. A’s charges. This is because we believe that it cannot be concluded that the meeting did not proceed just because Mr. A applied for leave, etc., as claimed.

Attorney Jeong Jae-bong of Daeryun Law Firm, who represented Mr. A, explained, “This issue arose because Mr. A used the budget at the time of using annual leave, or the attendees listed on the budget application were different from the actual attendees,” adding, “Although there may have been administrative errors such as mistakes in the use of some cards or omission of attendees, it was by no means a private use of the budget.”

He added, “Mr. A only wrote and submitted a business plan according to requests while carrying out the business, and there was no intention or purpose of forgery or event.” He added, “All of Mr. A’s budget usage details in question in this case were used for actual purposes.”

Reporter Kwon Byeong-seok (bsk730@fnnews.com)

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Government officials accused of ‘suspicion of misappropriation of legal documents’ ‘non-transferred’… Why? (Shortcut)