Parker was initially found guilty of multiple charges of abuse of power, bribery and coercion, and was initially sentenced to 24 years in prison. The allegations are related to a large-scale influence peddling case that triggered widespread protests, involving some of the most powerful figures in the country, and resulted in her being removed from office in 2017.
After the retrial, Park Geun-hye reduced his sentence in 2018 to 20 years in July last year. Prosecutors appealed the sentence and demanded a heavier sentence, but according to a court press release, the South Korean Supreme Court upheld Park Shu Park’s 20-year prison sentence on Thursday.
The Supreme Court is South Korea’s Supreme Court, which means that Thursday’s judgment is expected to end Park Geun-hye’s legal avenues to appeal his judgment.
Park will have to serve 22 years in prison-she will face another two years in prison in 201
8 for interfering in the nomination of the candidate for the conservative party Saenuri, led by her.
“This is the conclusion of the national corruption incident that occurred after the people’s candlelight revolution, the impeachment of the General Assembly, and judicial decisions. This is the embodiment of the constitutional spirit of our Democratic Republic, marking the progress and maturity of Korean democracy,” South Korean President Blue House Said in a statement on Thursday. “We must ensure that this unfortunate incident-the imprisonment of the former president-is taken as a historical lesson and avoid repeating the same mistakes.”
Korean corruption scandal
Park Geun-hye (Park Geun-hye) is the daughter of former dictator Park Chung-hee (Park Chung-hee). She became South Korea’s first female president after taking office in 2013.
But her tenure was affected by the controversy. In 2017, she became the country’s first democratically elected leader. After the country’s Constitutional Court upheld the parliamentary vote to impeach her, she was forced to remove her.
The vote came after millions of South Koreans took to the streets to demand Park’s dismissal within a few months. After news about her adviser and confidant, Choi Soon-sil, the daughter of a cult leader, had undue influence, they voted.
Soon after Parker was fired, she was arrested and tried for soliciting bribes from major Chinese companies, including Samsung. In 2018, she was tried on a separate charge because she was accused of obtaining illegal funds from the National Intelligence Agency.
The scandal also involved several other aspects. In 2018, the park’s confidant Cui Mou was sentenced to 20 years in prison and fined $16.6 million for 18 counts of abuse of power, coercion, fraud and bribery.
In 2017, Samsung Chief Executive Lee Jae-yong was convicted of bribery and other corruption charges and sentenced to five years in prison. In 2018, a high court lowered his sentence and sentenced him to four years in prison, although he has retrialed the crime since then and is expected to deliver his sentence next week. In a related case, he was sued in a controversial 2015 merger last year, which helped him strengthen his control of the company.
CNN’s Paula Hancocks, Yoonjung Seo and James Griffiths contributed to this report.
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