Lee Man-hee Remains in Custody as Court Rejects Appeal Over Detention

[Financial News] Lee Man-hee, the head of Shincheonji, who is accused of orchestrating the mass enrollment of followers into the People Power Party, asked the court to review the legality of his detention, but the request was denied.
After holding a detention review for Lee, who is accused of violating the Political Parties Act and other offenses, duty judge Park Chan-beom of the Seoul Central District Court rejected the petition on the 28th, saying, "There is no reason to grant the request."
Lee was detained on the 24th on suspicion that, from 2021 to 2024, he forced more than 50,000 followers to join the party in an effort to influence the People Power Party's presidential and general election primaries. He filed a request for detention review with the court on the 26th.
The arrest warrant sought by the Joint Prosecutor-Police Investigation Task Force also reportedly included charges of obstruction of business, alleging that the organized party enrollment campaign disrupted the People Power Party's election-related operations.
This is the third time Lee has been detained. He was previously arrested in 2020, early in the COVID-19 outbreak, on charges that he and Shincheonji officials submitted incomplete or false lists of members and facility information to health authorities, obstructing the government's epidemiological investigations and other quarantine work.
Before Shincheonji was founded in 1980, he was also detained on defamation charges after criticizing Yu Jae-yeol, the founder of the Korea Christian Tabernacle Temple, where he had once been involved.
psh@fnnews.com Park Sung-hyun Reporter