Lawmaker blasts police for 'sloppy' investigations at national audit

Calls emerged Monday for police to conduct an accurate assessment of their investigative workload as they take on a greater role in handling everyday criminal cases following a sweeping reform of the criminal justice system.

Critics say police case-processing times are being undercounted, distorting workforce planning. Police currently track only the duration of initial investigations — up to the point of referral or non-referral to prosecutors — and do not include time spent on supplementary or re-investigations, leading to significant discrepancies in the figures.

Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Yang Bu-nam raised the issue at the national audit of the Korean National Police Agency held at the agency's headquarters in Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, on Monday. "Police are working themselves to death, but there is time spent on investigations that never shows up in the statistics," Yang said. "Officially, the average investigation takes about 60 days — but the public feels it takes two to three years. How can anyone trust the police with numbers like that?"

Yang's criticism centered on the widening gap between the initial case-processing period and the total time including supplementary and re-investigations, a disparity that has grown since the redistribution of investigative authority between prosecutors and police. Police publicly report only the initial processing period — ending when a referral or non-referral decision is made — but the actual duration stretches considerably longer once follow-up investigations are factored in.

A Board of Audit and Inspection review of police supplementary and re-investigation practices last year found that such cases accounted for 8.5 percent of all investigations in 2024, with an average duration of 84.7 days. Adding that to the initial investigation period of 56.2 days puts the estimated total case-processing time at 140.9 days — nearly five months.

Despite this, the Korean National Police Agency does not link supplementary and re-investigation records to the original cases, making it impossible to track total investigation durations or analyze the causes of delays.

"Conduct an accurate, realistic assessment of the actual workload," Yang said at the audit. "Only by properly measuring the workload can you determine the staffing needed and ensure investigators are not overburdened."

He added that getting the numbers right was also key to retaining talent. "That is the only way to stop capable people from leaving investigative units," he said. "Statistics are the single most important tool for measuring workload accurately. You have to stop putting out self-serving numbers that just say 'police did great, cases were handled quickly' — that kind of window-dressing has to end."

Yang also took aim at the volume of objections being filed against police investigations. "Complaints against police investigations keep piling up. Is that a sign of good work? It is proof that police are conducting investigations sloppily," he said. "If these statistics are not fixed, the public will never trust a word the police say. Police are sacrificing their investigators just to tout some hollow claim about speedy case resolution."

Acting Commissioner General Kim Jong-cheol acknowledged the criticism. "I am well aware of the concerns about how police calculate investigation periods," he said. "I think it is fair to say there have been aspects of how we manage statistics that have been convenient for the police." He added that the agency was reviewing how to make its statistics more useful to the public and was considering linking supplementary investigation periods to the original cases when calculating total duration. "We will absolutely fix this," he said.