Problems caused by jumbling of investigative agencies and countermeasures

Recently, the Korean National Police Agency, the Prosecution Serivice, and the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials(CIO) have been clashing over the initiative in the investigation of high-ranking public officials' crimes. Competitive exercise of investigative powers leads to overlapping investigations, which infringes on the fundamental rights of the subjects of investigation, and in a broad sense, violates the principle of double jeopardy, and goes against the principles of human rights protection and speedy trials. In addition, it can lead to abuse of the state's investigative powers at the national and social level, increase inefficiency, and cause the public to distrust criminal justice institutions. As an alternative to this, this paper proposes limiting the the CIO’s case transfer request which is stipulated in Article 24 of the CIO Act. Exceptions should be made in Article 24 of the CIO Act in cases where another agency has requested a warrant first, when another agency's end of investigation is imminent, or when the case is an arrest. The CIO should obtain approval from the head of the relevant investigative agency when transferring a transferred case to the same agency. In addition, the definition of the ‘directly related crimes’ should be clear to prevent conflict between the Prosecution Service and the CIO in investigation power. The absence of specific legal provisions regarding the procedures between the Procecution Service and the CIO for crimes in which the CIO prosecutors only have the right to investigate raises the issue of criminal procedure legalism. Therefore, detailed regulations regarding the transfer of cases between the Prosecutor Service and the CIO should be established. On the other hand, in the case of crimes in which the CIO prosecutors have both the right to investigate and the right to indict, the CIO procecutors selectively exercises its investigative powers, and in many cases, the Prosecutor Service procecutors conduct the investigation and then the CIO procecutors only indicts. The selective exercise of investigative powers is not only problematic in terms of the fair exercise of investigative powers, but also runs counter to the purpose of introducing the CIO. Therefore, it is necessary for the CIO procecutors to directly investigate and prosecute cases in the future.