[Exclusive] Case Not Referred Despite ₩19.2 Million Unpaid, Citing ‘Money Returned’... Pyeongtaek Police Face Questions Over Shoddy Investigation

[Financial News] Pyeongtaek Police Station in Gyeonggi Province decided not to refer a fraud complaint to prosecutors, citing reasons including the suspect’s return of at least ₩30 million, but the actual unrecovered amount was found to be in the ₩19 million range. Amid allegations that police closed the case without adequately examining the nature of repeated deposits and withdrawals, the Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office called for a supplementary investigation to establish the specific purposes of the money exchanged between the two sides. Controversy over a shoddy investigation has intensified after it also emerged that investigators could not find 29 transcripts submitted by the complainant and asked for them to be resubmitted.
According to a review of Financial News reporting on the 4th, Pyeongtaek Police Station decided on September 16 not to refer A, who had been accused of fraud. The victim, identified only by the surname Kim, alleged that A demanded money by promising jobs at large construction sites and a position as a construction-section manager, but that no job was ever secured.
According to Kim, A was someone Kim met at a construction site in Samcheok, Gangwon Province, in December 2023. A asked for money as “business expenses” to entertain people connected to the construction site. Kim’s side said that A initially returned the money he had borrowed as promised, but later repeatedly asked for transfers, citing job placement.
In its decision not to refer the case, police determined that A had received a total of ₩26,131,000 from Kim in 32 transfers between December 2023 and November 2024. It concluded that it was difficult to establish fraud, citing, among other things, that A had returned at least ₩30 million to Kim.

However, an analysis of Kim’s bank transaction records and transfer comparison table obtained by this publication found that, across 116 transactions between the two sides, Kim sent a total of ₩53,069,000 to A and related parties. Kim received ₩33.23 million in return, leaving a simple net difference of ₩19,839,000.
The transaction records repeatedly showed cases in which the same amount was sent again immediately after being returned. On May 7, 2024, for example, Kim sent ₩500,000 to A and received it back about three hours later, but then sent the same amount again and got it back nine minutes later. Multiple deposits and withdrawals of ₩500,000 each also took place that day.
Kim argued that counting these repeated transactions as repayments overstated the extent to which the losses had actually been recovered. He said that police had not adequately examined the nature of individual transactions, even though the total amount returned alone was not enough to determine whether the debt had genuinely been repaid.
Allegations were also raised that transcripts submitted by Kim had not been properly managed during the investigation. According to a call recording from September 7 obtained by this publication, the investigator in charge at the time asked Kim, “You submitted 31 transcripts, but I can’t find 29 of them. Could you submit them again?”
Kim said he submitted 31 transcripts when he first filed a complaint last year and again when he filed a new complaint this year. His side said the transcripts included details of requests for money, acknowledgments of debt, and statements related to gambling. Kim questioned whether police had adequately reviewed key evidence before deciding not to refer the case.
Pyeongtaek Police Station denied the allegations of a shoddy investigation, saying, “Based on the deposit and withdrawal records, we comprehensively reviewed the actual loan and repayment amounts, whether interest had been paid, and other factors before deciding not to refer the case.” Regarding the alleged missing transcripts, it countered, “All 31 were there from the beginning, and when we checked two or three times, they were still there,” adding, “Documents we receive are immediately entered into the Korea Information System of Criminal Justice Services (KICS), so there is no risk of them being lost.”
The case is now being reinvestigated after the Suwon District Prosecutors’ Office, following Kim’s objection, called on October 7 for the specific purposes of the financial transactions between the two sides to be established. Police are also said to have determined during the supplementary investigation that the unrecovered amount was in the ₩19 million range. The original investigator was transferred to another department, and a new investigator is reviewing the individual transfer records and the nature of the funds.
Kim also said that after the decision not to refer the case, he had to reorganize the investigative materials himself, taking on additional financial and emotional burdens. He claimed that expenses for transcribing the recordings, a judicial scrivener, lost wages, and transportation alone amounted to about ₩2 million.
Kim said, “I started this to get my money back, but I had to reorganize and submit evidence myself that the police hadn’t examined,” adding, “The time and stress I spent checking my bank statements and the transcripts can’t even be put into monetary terms.”
[email protected] Lee Dong-hyeok Reporter