PSS chief at center of controversy for derailing court-approved attempt to arrest Yoon, allegedly with armed human barricade

Personnel from the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials and the police, attempting to execute a warrant to arrest suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol, are blocked by a bus ordered stationed by the Presidential Security Service in front of the presidential residence in Yongsan, central Seoul, on Friday. (Newsis)
Personnel from the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials and the police, attempting to execute a warrant to arrest suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol, are blocked by a bus ordered stationed by the Presidential Security Service in front of the presidential residence in Yongsan, central Seoul, on Friday. (Newsis)

Between his legal obligation to comply with a court-issued arrest warrant and his duty to protect the president, Park Jong-joon, chief of the Presidential Security Service appears to have chosen the latter.

"For the Presidential Security Service, whose very purpose is to guarantee the president's absolute safety, complying with an arrest warrant carried out amid legal controversies and irregularities amounts to abandoning my duty to protect the president and constitutes a dereliction of duty," he said in a video statement defending his actions.

He added, "If my judgment in this matter is flawed, I am willing to bear any legal consequences."

This rare statement from a chief presidential bodyguard, who seldom appears before the public, came after he was catapulted into the center of controversy for derailing the execution of a court-issued warrant to arrest suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol, allegedly with armed guards forming a human barricade. Local reports show that the PSS has turned the residential compound into a fortress, with barbed wire installed around the premises.

Lawmakers of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea, including floor leader Park Chan-dae, claimed Sunday that Park had instructed presidential bodyguards to shoot at investigators from the CIO and the police, a law enforcement agency he worked for almost 30 years, if they enter Yoon's residence.

The Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials, judging Park to be a suspect, summoned him for questioning Saturday for obstructing the investigative body's carrying out of the arrest warrant, but he refused to appear.

President Yoon Suk Yeol (left) shakes hands with Chief Park Jong-joon, head of the Presidential Security Service, at the presidential office in Seoul on Sept. 9, 2024, when Park was appointed to the post. (Newsis)
President Yoon Suk Yeol (left) shakes hands with Chief Park Jong-joon, head of the Presidential Security Service, at the presidential office in Seoul on Sept. 9, 2024, when Park was appointed to the post. (Newsis)

Park, now facing another execution of the warrant to arrest Yoon by the joint investigative body consisting of the CIO and police, is a former elite police officer who graduated from the Korea National Police University summa cum laude in 1986. During his college years, he passed a higher-level civil service exam, which led him to begin his police career in the high-ranking position of superintendent.

At 46, he was promoted to deputy commissioner general, the second-highest post in the police, but resigned the following year to enter politics.

He ran as a National Assembly candidate for the conservative Saenuri Party, a predecessor to Yoon's People Power Party, in Gongju, South Chungcheong Province, in 2012 but was defeated. In 2013, he was appointed deputy chief of the Presidential Security Service during the conservative Park Geun-hye administration, where he served for two years.

At the time, one of Park’s colleagues at the PSS was Noh Sang-won, the former director of the Defense Intelligence Command who is now suspected of masterminding Yoon's Dec. 3 martial law plan, according to local reports.

Park was a candidate for the National Assembly in the 2016 general election, running to represent Sejong City, but was again unsuccessful. For eight years, he remained out of public service until September last year, when he was appointed chief of the Presidential Security Service. He succeeded Kim Yong-hyun, who was promoted to minister of defense.

Police suspect Park of involvement in the conspiracy to carry out Yoon's botched imposition of martial law, according to local reports.

He is alleged to have summoned Police Commissioner General Cho Ji-ho and Seoul Metropolitan Police Chief Kim Bong-sik to a presidential safe house in Samcheong-dong, Seoul, the night of Dec. 3 when Yoon declared martial law, raising further questions about his involvement.