President Yoon Suk Yeol's criminal trial begins Thursday, with the embattled leader to be defended by a team of 11 high-profile lawyers with distinguished legal and political careers.
The latest addition to the team is Hwang Kyo-ahn, who was prime minister under former President Park Geun-hye and served as acting president when Park was impeached over a corruption scandal.
Hwang reportedly notified the Seoul Central District Court of his appointment as Yoon’s lawyer in early February.
Despite his late addition to Yoon’s legal team, the 67-year-old has insisted since last December that Yoon's martial law declaration on Dec. 3 did not constitute an act of insurrection. He was one of the biggest names to openly defend the martial law decree.
Hwang claimed that insurrection charges apply when a person initiates violence for the purpose of “subverting the Constitution,” and argued that Yoon’s attempt was made to protect the country and its constitutional order.
The former prime minister previously led the United Future Party, a predecessor to today’s ruling People Power Party in 2020, but Hwang's party suffered a landslide defeat in that year's parliamentary elections.
Seok Dong-hyeon will appear in both the impeachment trial and the criminal trial.
Seok, a confidant of Yoon and a former classmate at the Seoul National University School of Law, publicly denied the insurrection charges on social media before the National Assembly’s impeachment motion was passed on Dec. 14.
Though Seok wanted to help his longtime friend as an aide, he officially joined the legal team in late January.
The lawyer started his legal career at the Busan District Prosecutors’ Office, served as a spokesperson for the Supreme Prosecutors’ Office in the early 2000s and worked as chief prosecutor of the Seoul Eastern District Prosecutors’ Office in 2012.
Kim Kye-ri, the youngest attorney on Yoon’s legal team, who has gained prominence during his impeachment trial, will defend the president at the Seoul Central District Court as well.
Unlike the prosecutors-turned-lawyers who worked with Yoon during their time at prosecutors’ offices or the president's former SNU classmates, the 41-year-old worked as a public interest lawyer in Seoul, providing legal consultation for Seoul Namdaemun Police Station and Seoul Dongdaemun Police Station.
In 2017, Kim defended Choo Myeong-ho, a former chief of the National Intelligence Service's domestic intelligence unit who was charged with abuse of power and violating the law banning the NIS from involvement in politics. Her efforts led the court to deny an arrest warrant for Choo.
sj_lee@heraldcorp.com
