South Korean Official Misappropriates Public Funds for Crypto Investments

According to PANews, recent evidence has unveiled the full extent of a South Korean official's misappropriation of $342,000 (497.16 million won) in public funds for personal cryptocurrency investments, including significant flood relief donations. The official, referred to as 'A', was sentenced to five years in prison last December for embezzling city budget and public organization funds. The case is currently under review in a higher court, with the possibility of the sentence being extended or overturned. The embezzlement occurred over a six-year period from November 2018 to May 2023, but the complete scope of the crime, including the misappropriation of flood donations, was only fully revealed in an audit report released by the Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) on Tuesday. The BAI investigation found that the official had access to multiple seals from the Cheongju city government and third-party business operators, allowing him to bypass normal procedures and repeatedly divert funds. He was able to forge project expenses and approve electronic transactions without proper oversight from superiors, who failed to verify the legitimacy of these requests. Additionally, the mayor's seal was often left unattended without adequate security measures, and the official's direct superior did not properly manage accounting procedures or verify expenditures.