Permanent Special Prosecutor Team for Kwan Bong-kwon and Coupang summons Geonjin Beopsa (Jeon Seong-bae) as witness

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[The Financial News] The Permanent Special Prosecutor Team for Kwan Bong-kwon and Coupang, headed by Special Prosecutor Ahn Gwon-seob, has summoned Geonjin Beopsa (Jeon Seong-bae) as a witness as part of its investigation into allegations that currency band labels for bundled banknotes were discarded.
According to legal sources on the 19th, the special prosecutor team has been questioning Jeon, who is being held at the Seoul Detention Center, at its office in Seocho District, Seoul, since around 10 a.m. that day.
The allegations over the discarding of currency band labels stem from an incident in December 2023, when the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors' Office searched Jeon's home and seized bundles of cash, including 50 million won worth of bundled banknotes issued by the Bank of Korea (BOK), but then lost the paper bands and stickers attached to the bundles that recorded information such as the date of verification, the staff in charge, and the department.
Bundled banknotes are divided into newly manufactured notes that the Bank of Korea (BOK) receives from the Korea Minting and Security Printing Corporation (KOMSCO), and circulated notes that the BOK has retrieved from commercial banks and sorted as fit for use. The circulated bundles come in plastic wrapping marked as circulated notes, which also indicates the packaging date and time, quantity, and other details.
Photographs taken at the time by the investigation team of the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors' Office show that the stickers on the bundles of cash found at Jeon's residence were also marked as circulated notes. However, after losing the paper bands, the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors' Office was unable to trace the source of the cash and handed the case over to the Min Jung-ki Special Prosecutor Team, which is investigating allegations related to Kim Keon Hee.
The Seoul Southern District Prosecutors' Office explained that an employee had accidentally lost the bands in the course of counting the cash as a work-related mistake.
The special prosecutor team is investigating whether there were any instructions or involvement from higher-ups in the discarding of the bundled banknotes. On this day, it is expected to question Jeon about the origin of the bundled banknotes and how they were stored.
Jeon was indicted and taken into custody last September on charges that, in collusion with Kim Keon Hee, he received valuables worth a total of more than 80 million won—including a diamond necklace and a Chanel bag—from Yun Young-ho, head of the Unification Church global headquarters, between April and July 2022 in return for a request to support the religious organization. The first-instance verdict in his case is scheduled to be delivered on February 11.
kyu0705@fnnews.com Kim Dong-gyu Reporter