[#서초동]The strange day of ‘Scene Stealer’ Shim Jae-cheol … ‘Midnight Chase’ with reporters from the disciplinary committee

Entry 2020.12.11 09:30 | Revision 2020.12.11 09:41

At approximately 10:00 pm on the 10th, the first deliberation of the Prosecutor’s Disciplinary Committee against Attorney General Yoon Seok-yeol ended. In front of the Ministry of Justice building in Gwacheon, Gyeonggi-do, reporters were busy cleaning up the scene. Reporters were finishing their articles in the first-floor lobby, while reporters for the cameras carried equipment.

At that moment, a black vehicle stopped in front of the Ministry of Justice. Among the reporters, it was said that it was Shim Jae-cheol, the chief prosecutor of the Department of Justice. Director Shim was the disciplinary committee’s ‘scene stealer’ that day – a supporting actor who gets more attention than the title role for his outstanding acting skills. Even in the morning, the focus was on Justice Minister Chu Miae and President Yoon, but as the disciplinary committee proceeded, Director Shim got all the attention. To hear Director Shim’s position, the journalists stopped working and waited for Director Shim at the main gate of the government building. Of course, I thought the car would go out the front door where it stopped.

However, the situation became strange when someone from the Ministry of Justice whispered something to the security guard on the first floor. After a conversation between a Justice Department employee and a security guard, I suddenly saw someone hiding on the stairs running out the back door with a briefcase. Then the words came out, “This is Headmaster Shim Jae-cheol!”, And at the same time, the black vehicle that was in front of the main gate started up and streaked towards the parking lot connected to the gate. rear. (There is also a back door on the first floor of the Ministry of Justice, but it is usually closed late at night.)

In a short time, dozens of reporters carried out a chase, turning around, around the Ministry of Justice building to catch Director Shim and the vehicle. He managed to catch up with Director Shim just before getting in the car, but he “ banged ” on the door without answering any questions from reporters and drove off. There was a joke among reporters that said, “I filmed a ‘Catch Me If You Can’ movie with director Shim.”

Principal Shim is the “point man” of Yoon’s disciplinary committee. Among the reasons for President Yoon’s disciplinary action is the party that denounced the ‘court of law analysis document’, which raised suspicions of a judicial inspection. In February this year, Director Shim was serving as the head of the great swordsman’s anti-corruption force, and recently revealed that he was “very angry” after seeing the “court of justice analysis” conducted by the great swordsman. Director Shim is known to have reported this document to the Ministry of Justice last October, when Minister Chu began disciplining and inspecting President Yun.

Director Shim’s role didn’t end here. He even served as a member of the disciplinary committee, the “judge” of the disciplinary committee. Minister Chu nominated Director Shim as one of two members of the disciplinary committee he can nominate. Director Shim said that the day before, he went to work in his office on the sixth floor of the Ministry of Justice around 9 a.m. and moved to the disciplinary committee meeting room on the seventh floor around 10:30 a.m. . The informant even assumed the role of judge in the case he denounced.

In fact, Director Shim’s ‘strange day’ began in earnest from then on. Principal Shim, who attended the disciplinary committee as a member of the disciplinary committee, left after filing an “ escape ” request when President Yoon’s side requested an escape right after lunch. It is natural that it is not possible to deliberate fairly about the case in which the person was involved, which is why it has been criticized that it should have been earlier to request evasion.

Initially, President Yoon’s side filed an appeal against 4 out of 5 disciplinary members. When the request for challenge is received, the rest of the members of the disciplinary committee, excluding those with reasons for challenge, will decide whether or not to accept the request for challenge by majority vote. Director Shim was involved in the decision to remove the rest of the disciplinary committee and requested evasion when it was finally time to discuss his request for evasion.

Yoon’s side strongly refuted that it is a violation of the rules that a person who should not have been involved in the appeal resolution process from the beginning adjusted the evasion time so that all appeals were rejected. If Director Shim requested the “ override ” from the beginning, the number of disciplinary members would be 4, making it impossible to judge whether or not to dismiss due to insufficient quorum of most of the rejection reasons that are common to the two disciplinary members. In this case, a disciplinary member must be supplemented to determine whether to dismiss him or not. To avoid this situation, Director Shim participated in the decision to challenge another disciplinary member and ultimately fell.

In this way, Director Shim, the first-class collaborator who rejected Yoon’s request for rejection, returned to the office on the sixth floor. However, within hours, Principal Shim’s name returned from the disciplinary committee. Director Shim was selected as a witness to be subpoenaed in the witness newspaper scheduled for the 15th. It is the disciplinary committee that has called Director Shim as a witness, not by Yun or Chu. In just a few hours, Director Shim’s role changed from informant to judge and from judge to witness.

A legal official noted that “President Moon Jae-in emphasized the fairness of the disciplinary process, but the existence of Director Shim, who becomes a witness after the informant becomes a judge, is a clear example of the committee’s injustice. disciplinary”.

Director Shim won Moon Jae-in’s administration. Born in Wanju, Jeollabuk-do, he served as head of the Policy Planning Division of the Ministry of Justice under the administration of Moon Jae-in, spokesperson for the Ministry of Justice and later as head of the preparation of the personal hearing for the Minister Chu. Subsequently, he was promoted to the prosecution and served as head of the anti-corruption force in the grand prosecutor’s office. Earlier this year, while insisting that former Justice Minister Cho Kuk was not charged at the home of a Sanggat, I heard a junior prosecutor say, ‘Are you a prosecutor?’