Supreme Court-lawmaker
Supreme Court finalizes loss of seat for ruling party lawmaker over fraud
By Lee Haye-ah
SEOUL, March 12 (Yonhap) -- The Supreme Court on Thursday finalized a ruling stripping Rep. Yang Moon-seok of his parliamentary seat after convicting him of fraud.
Yang of the ruling Democratic Party had been sentenced by a lower court to 18 months in prison, suspended for three years, for taking out a fraudulent loan in 2021.
The top court upheld the ruling. By law, members of the National Assembly are stripped of their seats if a criminal punishment of at least a prison term, including suspended ones, is finalized.
The Supreme Court's decision came on the same day a revised law took effect, allowing petitions to be filed with the Constitutional Court to review finalized rulings.
Yang wrote on Facebook after the ruling that if it appears to have "overlooked the basic rights" of his family, he will consult his lawyers and "receive the judgment of the Constitutional Court."
Yang and his wife, surnamed Seo, were indicted in 2024 on charges of fraud for allegedly taking out a 1.1 billion-won (US$744,000) loan from a credit union under the false pretext of business operation funds for their college student child and using it to purchase an apartment in Seoul's Seocho Ward.
The lawmaker was also charged with violating the Public Official Election Act by posting a false defense of his actions on Facebook ahead of the 2024 general elections and underreporting the value of his apartment during candidate registration.
A lower court had fined him 1.5 million won for the alleged violation, which, if finalized, would also have cost him his parliamentary seat as a 1 million-won fine is enough in cases involving the election law.
The Supreme Court struck down that ruling, however, and sent it back to the appellate court, citing a misunderstanding of legal principles.
Meanwhile, it confirmed Yang's wife's sentence of two years in prison, suspended for three years.
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