Samsung boss acquitted. He was again facing long-term imprisonment

Jay Y. Lee (or Lee Jae-yong), is worth almost $11 billion, making him the second richest Korean and ranking 183rd on the Forbes world list. Now the billionaire could have gotten into more trouble with the law, but he was acquitted.

The head of Samsung acquitted in another high-profile case. The prosecutor’s office wanted a long sentence

Like , on Monday, a court in Seoul found that Jay Y. Lee is innocent of any of the charges and can be released. Lee was accused of stock manipulation and accounting fraud in the high-profile merger of the Korean textile company Cheil Industries and the construction and engineering company Samsung C&T.

The prosecutor’s office accused him of deliberately inflating the value of Cheil, a company related to his family, and underestimating the value of the other company before the merger, which was supposed to help him strengthen his position in Samsung Electronics, the flagship company of the entire Samsung group. They demanded at least five years in prison for Lee and compensation in the amount of 500 million won (PLN 1.51 million). Lee’s lawyers denied all allegations and explained that the merger made it easier to stabilize the management of the entire conglomerate.

A court in the South Korean capital said it saw no evidence that Lee or other executives intended to harm Samsung C&T or its shareholders. It was held that “even if Lee’s position was strengthened, the merger could not be considered unfair” because it had a “legitimate purpose.” Some experts are shocked by this verdict and consider it inappropriate.

Jay Y. Lee has been in serious trouble with the law before. In 2017, the entrepreneur was sentenced to five years in prison (later the sentence was commuted to 30 months) in a case that was the trial of the century for Koreans. . Ultimately, the billionaire was pardoned by the president of South Korea.