Ex-Unification Church chief gets 1 year, 6 months for bribing Kim Keon Hee with luxury gifts

The Supreme Court has upheld the conviction of Yoon Young-ho, former world headquarters chief of the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification — commonly known as the Unification Church — who was indicted on charges of delivering expensive gifts to Kim Keon Hee, wife of former President Yoon Suk Yeol, in exchange for lobbying on church-related matters.

The Supreme Court's Third Division, presided over by Justice Oh Seok-jun, on Thursday upheld the lower court's ruling, which had convicted Yoon on charges of embezzlement, violation of the Political Funds Act, destruction of evidence and violation of the Anti-Graft Act, sentencing him to one year and six months in prison.

The court found no errors in the lower court's logic or reasoning, and said the lower court had not misapplied legal principles governing the relevance of evidence to search-and-seizure warrants, the exclusionary rule for illegally obtained evidence, the intent to unlawfully appropriate in embezzlement, the principle of legality, or the mandatory mitigation provisions under the Kim Keon Hee Special Prosecutor Act.

The special prosecutor's team led by Min Joong-ki determined that Yoon had provided Kim with goods worth about 80 million won ($53,000) — including a Chanel handbag and a Graf diamond necklace — between April and July 2022, channeled through fortune teller Jeon Seong-bae, also known as "Geonjin Beopsa." The team indicted Yoon on charges of violating the Anti-Graft Act. The special prosecutor's office said Yoon made the deliveries in exchange for asking Kim to help resolve pending issues related to the Unification Church.

Yoon also faces charges of violating the Political Funds Act for allegedly handing 100 million won to People Power Party lawmaker Kwon Seong-dong — a close Yoon Suk Yeol ally known as one of the so-called "Yun-haek-gwan" inner circle — in January 2022, ahead of the presidential election, acting on instructions from Unification Church leader Han Hak-ja. The payment came shortly after Yoon Suk Yeol's election victory and was made as lobbying compensation. He also faces a separate embezzlement charge for allegedly misappropriating church funds to cover that payment.

The first trial sentenced Yoon to eight months for handing 100 million won to Kwon and six months for delivering the Chanel handbag and other items to Kim and for embezzlement, for a combined sentence of one year and two months. The second trial found him fully guilty on the embezzlement charges — which the first trial had only partially upheld — and increased the sentence to one year and six months.

However, both the first and second trials dismissed the destruction-of-evidence charges — related to Yoon's alleged deletion and manipulation of accounting program data after obtaining police investigation information about overseas gambling trips by Unification Church executives in the United States — ruling that the matter fell outside the special prosecutor's investigative jurisdiction.

On the same issue, the Supreme Court said Thursday that while the lower court's reasoning contained some inappropriate elements regarding whether to apply provisions of the Kim Keon Hee Special Prosecutor Act as amended and enacted on Sept. 26, 2025 — after the case was filed — the lower court's conclusion that the destruction-of-evidence charges fell outside the special prosecutor's investigative authority was ultimately correct, given the need to define investigative targets in a manner consistent with the purpose and intent of the act.