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Former Justice Minister Cho Kook attended the trial yesterday (3rd) as a witness to his wife, Professor Kyung-Shim Chung.
It was the first time that the two men stood in one court, and interest was drawn, but Cho, who was willing to uncover the truth in court, refused to testify on all questions from the prosecution.
Reporter Lee Hyun-young reports.
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Former Minister Cho Kuk, who appeared in the court as a witness, read the statement he had prepared after taking the oath as a witness.
"The defendant in this court is his spouse and his child's name is also on the prosecution."
He expressed his intention to refuse to testify.
Article 148 of the Criminal Procedure Act states that you or your relatives may refuse to testify if they are likely to be punished.
The prosecution immediately protested.
"It is difficult to convince former Minister Cho when he is under investigation by the prosecution and refuses to make a statement and says he will reveal the truth in court, and refuses to make a statement at trial."
Then I continued the newspaper.
The day after the prosecution's extensive seizure and search in August last year, former Minister Cho attended the National Assembly and asked why he said, "I have never changed my mobile phone."
In addition, by presenting the attributes of the certificate file for the Seoul National University Public Interest and Human Rights Law Center and the hotel internship certificate of former Minister Cho's daughter, it was questioned whether the former Minister Cho was involved in the preparation.
However, former Minister Cho Kook repeated 300 times in response to all these questions in the trial, saying, "I will follow Article 148 of the Criminal Procedure Act."