Lee Jae-young, the acting chairman of Samsung Electronics Co. was acquitted in a fraud case, reports Bloomberg.
A court in Seoul has cleared the top executive of charges related to stock price manipulation and accounting fraud. This will allow the billionaire to continue to lead the conglomerate, which is threatened by old and new competitors.
The judge at the Seoul Central District Court delivered the verdict after nearly an hour-long reading of the decision, focusing on whether Lee Jae-yong manipulated the 2015 merger of Samsung C&T Corp. and Cheil Industries Inc. to gain influence and undue advantage.
The judge pointed out a number of inconsistencies in the case. For example, there is no evidence of the billionaire’s intentions or that he or Samsung misled shareholders.
Lee Jae-yong’s lawyers said in a statement that they believe this justifies the controversial 2015 agreement and thanked the court.
The 55-year-old businessman has been embroiled in a legal battle for years that shook the tech world and triggered a political scandal that led to the impeachment of former South Korean President Park Geun-hye.
In November, prosecutors demanded a five-year prison sentence and a fine of 500 million won ($376,000) for Lee Jae-young on charges of stock price manipulation and accounting fraud.
The charges were related to the merger of two Samsung subsidiaries, which, according to prosecutors, helped strengthen the billionaire’s control over the conglomerate.
The businessman was first charged in 2017. That year, he was sentenced to five years in prison, but in 2018, after an appeal, the sentence was commuted to a suspended sentence and reduced to two and a half years.
In 2021, Lee Jae-yong was sentenced to two and a half years on bribery charges. But he was soon pardoned and in the fall of 2022 became the head of the Korean tech empire Samsung.
Loading comments …