Supreme Court justice nominee Oh Seok-jun (pictured, 60, 19th class of the Judicial Research and Training Institute) once ruled that it was just for a company to fire a bus driver who had embezzled 800 won. It was recently revealed that the lawyer who represented the company in the trial went to the same high school and was in the same class at the Judicial Research and Training Institute as Oh.

In the confirmation hearing at the National Assembly on August 29, Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Kim Seung-won asked Oh if his personal relationship with the bus company’s legal representative affected the ruling. Oh answered, “It was a long time ago, so I didn’t know,” and added, “I only found out after I examined the ruling recently.” He explained, “The lawyer in question was involved in 3-4 civil lawsuits that I oversaw, and he only won one case (bus driver case).”

In 2011, when Oh was a judge in Administrative Division 1 of the Seoul Administrative Court, Oh ruled that the bus company firing a bus driver for embezzling 800 won from the company’s operation profits was just. In 2013, when a prosecutor was suspended after receiving “entertainment” worth 850,000 won, Oh ruled to have the suspension canceled. The two contrasting decisions have triggered criticism that “If you’re rich, you're innocent; poor, you're guilty.”

During the confirmation hearing this day, lawmakers continued to criticize Oh for his lack of awareness and balance when it came to the socially vulnerable. Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Lee Tahney referred to Oh’s ruling against the bus driver who stole 800 won and said, “It was the most heartless ruling I have seen recently.” He also mentioned that the bus driver who was laid off was supporting his family of five by engaging in hard manual labor because he couldn’t get a job for the last ten years.

Oh said, “Presiding over trials for a long time, I have tried to consider the circumstances (of the parties involved in the litigation), but there were some parts that I failed to examine,” and added, “That (bus driver case) was a typical example.”

Oh’s personal acquaintance with President Yoon Suk-yeol also came under scrutiny. Oh entered the College of Law at Seoul National University a year after President Yoon, and the two are known to be close, having prepared for the state-run bar examination together. Oh said, “In college, we used to have drinks when we ate together, and when we met later, we sometimes enjoyed drinks when we met in the evening.” However, he further said, “In the past ten years, we probably met fewer than five times,” and added, “It (Oh’s nomination as Supreme Court justice) was not and could not have been affected by my personal relationship with the president.”

Concerning lawsuits that companies file against labor unions to oppress union activities, such as the Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering’s damage claim of 47 billion won against the workers who went on strike, Oh said, “I do not think it is right to abuse or misuse litigation to suppress the three basic labor rights and the just exercise of the right to strike.”