The police said Wednesday that it had rounded up a crime syndicate that operated an illicit gambling website that facilitated a total of 400 billion won ($390 million) in bets.“Twenty-nine members from five gangs in Gyeonggi Province were involved as store managers and recruiters,” the police said in a statement. “They operated the game, called “Badugi,” from March 2012 to May 2014.”A Suwon district court issued a warrant for custody of three gang members, including a leader surnamed Yang. In ad

Three main opposition lawmakers on Tuesday denied allegations that they had taken kickbacks from a vocational school that was trying to attain authorities’ approval to change its name.Their denials came a day after the prosecution unveiled its plan to verify the bribe charges against the three lawmakers of the New Politics Alliance for Democracy ― Reps. Shin Gye-ryoon, Kim Jae-yun and Shin Hak-yong.The prosecution said it would summon Shin Gye-ryoon and Kim in the coming days or weeks, adding th

The prosecution and the National Intelligence Service have been under public fire after officials rigged evidence to indict a former Seoul City public servant.The Justice Ministry, however, took lenient disciplinary actions against the prosecutors, who submitted fabricated documents to judges during the trial of ex-Seoul City official Yu Wu-seong over espionage charges. The spy agency NIS handed over the materials to the prosecutors. The three implicated prosecutors were working for the Seoul Ce

The prosecution interrogated the late Yoo Byung-eun’s chauffeur Yang Hoi-jeong for the third consecutive day, looking for clues pertaining to the tycoon’s death.While Yang was again summoned to the Incheon District Prosecutors’ Office on Thursday on charges of sheltering Yoo, or engaging in more grave malfeasance, the prosecution has yet to determine whether to ask the court to issue a warrant for his custody. 　Yang, 55, has continued to argue that he was not informed of the whereabouts of Yoo,

Investigators on Wednesday reconfirmed the dead body found on June 12 by a farmer in a South Jeolla Province city is that of Yoo Byung-eun via a fresh DNA comparison amid continuous doubts cast by critics over the corpse’s authenticity.The National Forensic Service conducted a test on DNA samples from Yoo Dae-kyoon, who was taken into custody on Monday, to compare his genetic makeup with the DNA of his deceased father Yoo Byung-eun.Police said the forensic agency has found that the genetic profi

The captain of a Coast Guard patrol boat who was arrested on Tuesday was found to have fabricated a public report on the April 16 Sewol ferry sinking, prosecutors said Wednesday.According to the Gwangju District Prosecutors’ Office, his earlier statement that “the Coast Guard patrol had used megaphones to instruct the Sewol passengers to get out of the ferry” right after they had arrived near the vessel at around 9:30 a.m., April 16, was found to be false.Later in the day, the prosecution asked

Migrant workers must now wait until they leave the country to receive severance pay. Migrant workers must leave the country when their visas expire, and according to law since 2011, South Korean employers have been obliged to pay their severance before their departure.The government introduced the policy, dubbed “departure guarantee insurance,” in August 2011 in an effort to prevent employers from withholding severance pay when migrant workers leave Korea as their permitted working period ends.H