Raid at Olympic Park ends after 6 hours... Election documents secured
The special prosecutor's team investigating the National Election Commission secured election documents and CCTV footage after conducting a roughly six-hour search and seizure of the handball stadium at Olympic Park in Songpa District, Seoul, on Friday, as part of its probe into the ballot shortage during the June 3 local elections, in which some voters were not given ballots. The stadium served as a ballot-counting station for the Songpa area at the time, and this was the first search and seizure conducted there. The raid ran from around 8:30 a.m. to about 2 p.m. The special counsel team effectively secured the relevant materials a day ahead of the public inspection of ballots scheduled for Saturday.
The search warrant named election commission officials, including former Supreme Court justice Roh Tae-ak, who served as NEC chair during the June 3 local elections, as suspects on charges such as dereliction of duty. The special counsel team believes the NEC mishandled election management by lowering the ballot printing quota from 60 percent to 50 percent of eligible voters and then failing to respond promptly to requests for additional ballots on election day. A key question in the investigation is whether officials knowingly turned a blind eye despite foreseeing the possibility of a ballot shortage.
On Saturday, the special counsel team will conduct a public inspection of roughly 2.47 million ballots from Songpa District, along with CCTV footage, at the handball stadium. It will verify the integrity of the ballots, checking for additions, omissions, or forgery, and will also examine voting and counting equipment and documents for errors and check whether the storage site was subject to any external intrusion. The inspection will proceed with some 100 observers, including lawmakers from both ruling and opposition parties, and more than 50 journalists in attendance.
The special counsel team is deploying more than 110 personnel for the public inspection, including its own prosecutors and deputy special prosecutors. It has also been given support from personnel and equipment of the National Police Agency and the National Forensic Service, as well as some 500 NEC staff to assist with verifying ballot quantities. The inspection is being carried out with the cooperation of relevant agencies, including the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, the National Election Commission, and KSPO & Culture (Korea Sports Promotion Foundation).
