Obstructing the Reading of the Seizure Warrant
We concluded that it was a violation of the freedom of action and the principle of observing
due process of law guaranteed in the Constitution for the police to collect the seizure warrant
while the petitioner was reading the warrant and thus recommended on November 29 that the
head of the respective Provincial Police Agency provide on-the-job education to the agency's
personnel on the execution of seizure warrants.
In accordance with our investigation, the respective police officer handed out a seizure
warrant of 28 pages to each of the two petitioners and collected one after about one minute and
minute from the second petitioner who had progressed to page 2.
Article 118 of the Criminal Procedure Act specifies that a search and seizure warrant shall be
presented to the person who is the subject of the warrant, and Article 114 (1) of the Criminal
Procedure Act and Article 58 of the Regulations on Criminal Procedure mandate the inclusion
in the warrant of the name and offense of the defendant; the articles to be seized; the place to
be searched; the date of the issuance of the warrant; the expiration date of the warrant; and the
reasons for search and seizure.
Although the respective police officer argued that he/she had explained the charges to them
in detail, we viewed that the petitioners must have been unable to obtain sufficient information
about the warrant because the reasons for seizure, targets of seizure, and restrictions on the
method of seizure are described on page 25 and page 28 of the two warrants and the two
petitioners only progressed to page 10 and page 2, respectively.
The police officer continued to assert that he/she orally explained the details of the warrants
to prevent the delay in their execution as they contained information about the crimes of
multiple suspects other than the petitioners, but it cannot be viewed as a legitimate presentation
considering the purpose of the warrant presentation system.
As such, we concluded that it was a violation of the freedom of action and the principle of
observing due process of law guaranteed in the Constitution for the police officer to allow the
petitioners to read only part of the warrants and collect them back.
National Human Rights Commission of Korea Annual Report 2018
91
Part 2 | Commission's Major Activities
40 seconds from the first petitioner who had progressed to page 10 and the other after about one