▲ Former National Security Office Chief Suh Hoon (left) and former Korea Coast Guard Commissioner General Kim Hong-hee leave the courtroom after the appellate sentencing hearing for the West Sea official killing case at the Seoul High Court in Seocho-gu, Seoul, on June 16.
Suh Hoon, former chief of the National Security Office at the Blue House, and Kim Hong-hee, former commissioner general of the Korea Coast Guard, have been acquitted in their appellate trial regarding the West Sea official killing case.
The Seoul High Court's Criminal Agreement Division 3 (Presiding Judge Lee Seung-han) upheld the not-guilty verdict from the first trial today (June 16) for both Suh and Kim, who were charged with drafting and using false official documents.
The court stated, "While the investigation results announced at the time included hasty or definitive expressions, it is difficult to conclude that they drafted and distributed false information that did not align with the truth," thereby rejecting the charges of creating false official documents against the two.
The West Sea official killing case refers to the incident in September 2020 when Lee Dae-jun, an official from the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, went missing in waters near the West Sea and was subsequently discovered and shot to death by North Korean troops.
Suh was accused of ordering the Korea Coast Guard to distribute false press releases suggesting that the search for Lee was ongoing while the fact of his killing was being concealed, and of directing the Coast Guard to draft and distribute reports and announcement materials to "fabricate" a case of voluntary defection to North Korea.
Kim was indicted on charges of distributing false materials regarding the possibility of defection to North Korea in accordance with those instructions.
The first trial had previously acquitted both Suh and Kim.
The prosecution appealed only some of the charges against them, leading to the second trial. Meanwhile, former National Intelligence Service Director Park Jie-won, former Minister of National Defense Suh Wook, and former NIS Chief of Staff Noh Eun-chae, who were indicted together and acquitted in the first trial, had their acquittals finalized as the prosecution did not appeal their cases.
(Photo: Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.