Ahead of the 2020 general election, the Supreme Court ruled that former lawmaker Cha Myung-jin's expulsion from the United Future Party was invalid due to procedural issues, which caused a controversy over the 'speaking of the Sewol ferry tent'.
According to the legal community today (15th), the second division of the Supreme Court (Chief Judge Cheon Dae-yeop) confirmed the lower court ruling in favor of the plaintiff in the appeal to confirm the invalidity of the expulsion decision made by former lawmaker Cha against the People's Power (former United Future Party).
Former lawmaker Cha said in a broadcast discussion in April 2020, "I already know an article about the Sewol ferry volunteers and their bereaved families doing indescribable promiscuity in the tent in May 2018," and was expelled two days before the general election.
Initially, the United Future Party recommended ex-Rep. Cha to leave the party, but since then, former member Cha posted on social media and criticized Kim Sang-hee, who was a competing candidate, for using inappropriate expressions. I decided.
Rep. Cha filed a lawsuit to confirm that the resolution of expulsion was invalid.
On April 14, 2020, the day before the general election, the court accepted the application of former Assemblyman Cha and decided to suspend the resolution of the expulsion, and former Assemblyman Cha ran as a candidate for the general election in the Gyeonggi Bucheonbyeong constituency of the Future United Party and was defeated.
After that, the first instance of the litigation on the merits held a judgment of dismissal in the case where the litigation requirements were not met.
It is that the lawsuit itself cannot be established as former lawmaker Cha personally filed a resignation report the day after the general election and resigned.
On the other hand, the second trial judged that the resolution to be expelled was invalid, stating that there was a serious flaw in the procedure in which the Future United Party decided to expel him from the Supreme Council without going through deliberation and resolution by the Ethics Committee at the time.
The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal without a hearing, noting that there was no problem with the second instance judgment.
Apart from the expulsion trial, former lawmaker Cha lost in the first trial for damages filed by 126 family members of the Sewol ferry disaster.
In December of last year, the 2nd Civil Division of the Bucheon Branch of the Incheon District Court (Chief Judge Lee Jeong-hee) said, "If you look at the vocabulary used by (former Rep. Cha), you can see the intention to maliciously criticize and ridicule the family of the Sewol ferry disaster, which is a degrading and derogatory attack on the person. "It can be seen as a crime," he ordered to pay 1 million won in alimony to each of the plaintiff's bereaved family members.
(Photo = Yonhap News)