"Endless conciliatory and statement seminars..."Lee Jae-myung's BTS hearing."

Lee Hwa-young appears as a witness while imprisoned..."Prosecutors manipulate cases"
"In the warehouse in front of the prosecutor's office, "Statement Seminar"...Repeatedly matching words"
The power of the people" baseless claims...Lee Hwa-young reverses the prosecution's statement."

[Anchor]
Former Gyeonggi Province Deputy Governor Lee Hwa-young, who was arrested for the Ssangbangwool remittance case, attended the impeachment hearing of the prosecutor in charge at the National Assembly while imprisoned, and repeatedly claimed that he was conciliated and pressured during the investigation.

The People's Power protested that the defendant, who was sentenced to heavy punishment in the first trial, was conducting a public opinion war outside the court to defend Lee Jae-myung, the leader of the Democratic Party.

I'm reporter Na Hye-in.

[Reporter]
In September 2022, former Lieutenant Governor Lee Hwa-young, who was arrested for taking bribes from Ssangbangwool Group, made a public appearance for the first time in two years.

He attended the impeachment hearing of the chief prosecutor of the remittance case to North Korea prepared by the opposition party as a witness while imprisoned.

Former lieutenant governor Lee, who has claimed to have been coaxed and coerced through prison letters, did not budge on his claim, saying the prosecution manipulated the case with the aim of prosecuting representative Lee Jae-myung.

[Lee Hwa-young/Former Gyeonggi-do Provincial Governor of Peace: If Lee Jae-myung is charged with third-party bribery, I have been offered to allow all of my punishment in the first trial to be offset and be released on bail....]

It also raised suspicions that the so-called "statement seminar" was repeated, in which people in the case, including former Chairman Kim Sung-tae, spoke with the officials in front of the prosecutor's office.

The opposition party said it had secured some records of its attendance in line with these claims.

[Seo Young-kyo / Democratic Party member: Kim Sung-tae starts at 1:11, Bang Yong-cheol at 1:11 and Lee Hwa-young at 1:11 and all three come in at 11:01. It's not a day or two like this.]

[Lee Hwa-young / Former Governor of Peace in Gyeonggi Province: If Kim Sung-tae wants to eat galbitang today, galbitang will be served, and if he wants jajangmyeon, jajangmyeon will be served....]

The power of the people was strongly opposed.

He countered that the former lieutenant governor's claims are only statements and circumstances, and that it is common for the case to escalate due to additional charges being detected during the investigation.

[Yoo Sang-beom/Secretary of the People's Power of the National Assembly Legislation and Judiciary Committee: This is a content that has no choice but to dispute the request of the statement. I can't help but be criticized as a hearing for the purpose of being involved in the trial.]

He criticized it as an unconstitutional act of pressuring the judiciary to broadcast live in the National Assembly what to contend with in court.

[Kwak Kyu-taek / People's Power: It is a rare case of obstruction of justice. As he said things he didn't want to say or didn't want to say for CEO Lee Jae-myung....]

In particular, if the former lieutenant governor Lee's claim was true, would the first trial court have sentenced him to nine and a half years in prison?

[Jang Dong-hyuk / People's Power: This hearing is for the defense of Lee Jae-myung's upcoming trial....]

The opposition party argued that the testimony of former lieutenant governor Lee Hwa-young has accumulated enough reasons to impeach the prosecutor in charge.

However, it remains to be seen whether the ruling party is right to impeach the incumbent prosecutor just for investigating the opposition leader and public opinion is not fair.

I'm Na Hye-in from YTN.

Photographer: Lee Sang-chang
Video editing: Jeon Ju-young