Soldier Expelled for Hiding 'Drunk Hit-and-Run' from 13 Years Ago... Court Rules 'Denial of Retirement Benefits Is Lawful'

[Financial News] The court has ruled that it was lawful to deny retirement allowance and pension payments to a soldier who was expelled before retirement after it was revealed he had previously received a prison sentence for a drunk hit-and-run.
According to the legal community on the 15th, the Administrative Division 2 of the Seoul Administrative Court, presided over by Judge Eun-Seol Ko, recently ruled against former soldier Mr. A in a lawsuit seeking to overturn the Armed Forces Financial Management Corps' decision to deny his Military Pension.
While serving in the Republic of Korea Army (ROKA), Mr. A, with a blood alcohol concentration of 0.169%, drove a car while heavily intoxicated, ran a red light, and collided with the front bumper of a taxi making a left turn from his right side before fleeing the scene. The taxi driver suffered a cervical sprain requiring two weeks of recovery, and the vehicle sustained approximately 150,000 KRW in damages.
At the time, Mr. A did not disclose his military status during the police investigation, so the case was not transferred to military authorities. In 2006, a civilian court sentenced him to eight months in prison with a two-year suspended sentence under the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Crimes for fleeing the scene. Mr. A continued his military service without further incident, but during the retirement process, the criminal conviction was belatedly discovered, leading to his expulsion and transfer to the supplementary service in 2019.
Despite this, Mr. A applied for a retirement allowance and pension in July 2021. The Armed Forces Financial Management Corps calculated his Military Pension based on 24 years and one month of service, granting him approximately 209.77 million KRW as a retirement allowance and pension. They continued to pay him a monthly retirement pension of 1,118,830 KRW until January 2023.
However, these payments resulted from a miscalculation of the statute of limitations' starting point. According to the Military Pension Act, the right to claim retirement benefits expires five years after the date of mandatory retirement due to a criminal conviction—in this case, from 2006, expiring in 2011. The Corps mistakenly considered the expulsion date of 2019 as the starting point, leading to payments that should not have been made. In February 2023, they halted the payments and initiated recovery of approximately 230 million KRW already disbursed.
Mr. A filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn the recovery order and won, arguing that while it was permissible to cancel future payments after the statute of limitations had expired, reclaiming the entire amount already paid was excessively harsh. Based on this, he requested the Corps to resume payment of the outstanding pension in September last year, but the Corps refused, citing the expiration of the statute of limitations. Mr. A then filed another lawsuit to challenge the refusal.
In this case, the court found that Mr. A's right to claim retirement benefits had already expired under the statute of limitations, and he was not eligible for Military Pension benefits. The statute of limitations began in 2006, when the criminal judgment was finalized, and expired in 2011.
The court stated, "Even though the Corps made a decision to pay the Military Pension and provided retirement benefits to Mr. A on September 14, 2021, after the statute of limitations had expired, this does not mean the Corps intended to waive the legal benefits of the statute of limitations. The payments were made in error, and it cannot be considered that the Corps forfeited its right to invoke the expiration of the statute of limitations."
scottchoi15@fnnews.com Choi Eun-sol Reporter