Episode 48

"The time limit has ended. Participants, please move to the mock courtroom."

The teaching assistant, who was acting as the supervisor, announced that just as we had barely finished writing the document.

"Wow, that was really tight. We almost didn't finish," Lee Ha-roo said, beads of sweat forming on her forehead.

"Real," Han Seol agreed.

I also didn't show it, but I had barely managed to catch my breath.

There were more elements that we had to consider than I had expected, and it had taken a long time to share our opinions while reviewing the materials.

But all of this was just the preparation process.

The real fight was about to begin.

It was time to strengthen our resolve even more.

"Then, let's go."

With that, I led my teammates to the mock courtroom.

"You've all worked hard. We'll skip the other procedures... and start with the opening statements," Jang Yong-hwan said, sitting in the judge's seat with the same posture as when we had entered, staring at everyone.

An opening statement, to put it simply, was a procedure where you stated the outline of your argument.

If it was the prosecution side, you would state that the defendant had done such and such an act, and that it corresponded to such and such a crime in Article such and such of the Criminal Act.

The defense side would either acknowledge or deny it.

Therefore, the order was to first listen to the prosecution's opening statement, and then the defense's opening statement.

"Honorable Judge," Jung Min-shik, as if it was natural, once again came forward as the representative of the other team and began.

As if trying to follow the format of a mock courtroom, he bowed to Jang Yong-hwan, who was sitting in the judge's seat, as if he had seen it somewhere.

"The defendant, Kim Gap-dong, stabbed and killed the victim, 'Na Pi-hae,' on such and such a date, and then fled while driving his vehicle while intoxicated."

First, he clearly stated the facts of the charges, that is, what the defendant had actually done.

"This is a serious crime that clearly corresponds to murder under Article 250 of the Criminal Act and drunk driving under Article 44 of the Road Traffic Act. During this trial, the prosecution will present specific evidence regarding the defendant's motive, method of murder, and the process of fleeing after the crime."

He declared the relevant articles of law and charges that could be applied to it. It was a clean and basic structure.

Now that the prosecution's opening statement was over, it was our turn.

"Defense, do you admit to the charges?"

Unlike the prosecution's opening statement, the defense's opening statement only required an answer to whether they admitted the charges that the prosecution was claiming.

If you answered 'yes' here, then it would become a 'sentencing argument' that aimed to reduce the sentence while admitting guilt, and if you answered 'no', then you would have to present a 'not guilty argument' that would block the proof of guilt.

At that moment when everyone's eyes were focused on me.

"No," I answered in a low voice.

"The defense completely denies all charges. The prosecution does not have any evidence to prove the defendant's guilt."

"Wh, what?" Jung Min-shik looked shocked.

"Hey, are you kidding me? Did you really come in here without reading the records? There's a mountain of evidence here, what kind of nonsense are you..."

"Be quiet," Jang Yong-hwan warned, and only then did he shut his mouth.

'There is a mountain of evidence, alright.'

But in the end, all of that would become unusable.

Because I would make it that way.

"Since the defense has denied the charges, I will begin the evidence verification procedure."

If you answered that you would not admit the crime, then a procedure would begin where you would seriously argue with evidence and legal principles.

'Evidence verification' is the process where the defendant acknowledges or denies each piece of evidence that has been submitted.

At this time, if the defendant acknowledges a piece of evidence, then its contents are accepted as is, and if they deny a piece of evidence, then they have to reveal the truth of its contents again through evidence examination or witness interrogation.

However, in this moot court competition, they don't directly examine the evidence again or call in witnesses.

That was because all of the necessary content was already included in the provided records.

So, the evidence examination procedure was done by pointing out problems with the already available materials or defending them.

"The first piece of evidence is... the blood alcohol measurement record of the defendant, Kim Gap-dong. Defense, do you acknowledge this evidence?"

It was the evidence that we had examined first and found the problems with. I answered with a confident voice.

"I do not acknowledge it."

"No...!"

Jung Min-shik cast a ridiculous glance at me, but that wouldn't change my stance.

"The second piece of evidence... do you acknowledge it?"

"I do not acknowledge it."

"The third... do you acknowledge it?"

"I do not acknowledge it."

The same question and answer were repeated for all of the evidence.

"Since the defense has denied all of the evidence, I will begin the evidence examination procedure."

The time had come.

First, the first piece of evidence, Kim Gap-dong's blood alcohol measurement record, was put on the chopping block.

"This evidence clearly proves that Kim Gap-dong's blood alcohol concentration at the time of driving was above the standard, violating Article 44 of the Road Traffic Act. There are no problems with the application of the Widmark formula, so why..."

"The problem is with the previous step," I cut off Jung Min-shik's words.

"The previous step, you say?"

"Your Honor, please look at the statement of the responsible judicial police officer regarding the circumstances of how this blood alcohol measurement record was obtained."

At the same time, I held up the statement, overlapping it with the blood alcohol measurement record.

"According to this statement, the judicial police officer who was in charge of the blood alcohol measurement conducted the blood alcohol measurement after forcibly opening the room door and seeing Kim Gap-dong's condition, even though Kim Gap-dong had clearly expressed his refusal by saying 'come back later'."

"What's the problem with that!"

"Article 308-2 of the Criminal Procedure Act. Illegally obtained evidence."

"...!"

"Forced investigations, such as searches, can only be done with a warrant. In this case, a search that went against the defendant's will was initiated without a warrant, and it also doesn't fall under the exceptional circumstances where a search can be done without a warrant."

I stared straight at Jung Min-shik.

"The blood alcohol measurement record, which was conducted based on an illegal search, is secondary evidence, and based on the fruit of the poisonous tree doctrine, one of the basic principles of the Criminal Procedure Act, it also becomes illegal evidence. Therefore, the prosecution cannot use this evidence to prove Kim Gap-dong's drunk driving charge."

There were no problems with the contents or truth of the blood alcohol measurement record itself as evidence.

Kim Gap-dong had actually driven while drunk, and the record that the police officer had left clearly revealed that fact.

Therefore, the point that we had to look at for the defense wasn't the evidence itself.

If you just stared at what was on the surface, you wouldn't be able to find an answer no matter how hard you looked.

The key was to point out the illegality in the situation that was subtly hidden in the shadows behind the evidence.

"Th, that's..."

Jung Min-shik's face turned pale.

"However, just because the evidence regarding the drunk driving charge has been denied, it doesn't mean that it's all over! There's still evidence to prove Kim Gap-dong's murder charge!"

"That's a valid point," I said, nodding.

"So, let's take a look at it from now on."

I picked up the document regarding the second piece of evidence on the list of evidence.

This time, it was the murder weapon with Kim Gap-dong's fingerprints and the victim's blood on it.

"Your Honor, this weapon is irrefutable evidence that clearly proves Kim Gap-dong's murder, and it was also seized in the form of voluntary submission, so there should be no problems with it."

Jung Min-shik emphasized with a look of pride.

Article 218 of the Criminal Procedure Act, Seizure of Voluntarily Submitted Items.

It was a regulation that stated that items that were voluntarily submitted by their owner, possessor, or custodian could be seized and investigated at will.

In general, in order to conduct forced investigations such as seizure and search, you have to satisfy all sorts of difficult conditions, including obtaining a warrant.

However, this wasn't the case for voluntarily submitted items.

Since it was an item that was submitted through their own will, it could be used as evidence without any special restrictions.

"The problem is, who is the one who 'voluntarily' submitted it?"

"Wh, what?"

I poured cold water on the smug Jung Min-shik.

"Please look at the seizure report of the weapon. Who is the one who voluntarily submitted the weapon here? Could it be the owner, the defendant Kim Gap-dong himself? No, it isn't."

I pointed at one section of the seizure report with my finger.

"The person who submitted this weapon is the manager of the mansion where Kim Gap-dong lives. He opened Kim Gap-dong's door for a facility maintenance inspection, found a blood-stained weapon, secretly took it out, and submitted it to the police."

"What's the problem with that?" Jung Min-shik protested.

"According to Article 218 of the Criminal Procedure Act, voluntary submission can be done not only by the owner of the item but also by the possessor. Since the manager took out the weapon, he can legally submit it voluntarily as the possessor, right!"

"You've studied Criminal Procedure Law hard," I said, twisting my lips into a smile.

Jung Min-shik was definitely a skilled guy.

He accurately knew the clauses related to seizure and search, and used them as the basis for his arguments.

There was only one way that he could have become this proficient in Criminal Procedure Law in such a short amount of time.

'You also knew, huh. That in order to prepare for this competition, you first have to study the investigation and evidence parts.'

If that was the case, then that was considerable insight.

Or maybe he had received advice from someone who had experience preparing for this.

'But.'

That wasn't enough.

The clauses were the starting point of all studies, the foundation, and above all, the most powerful weapon, but they didn't teach you everything that you needed to know.

"Does the prosecution perhaps know about the issue of 'illegally obtained evidence by a private individual'?"

"Illegally obtained evidence by a private... individual?"

The regulations about illegally obtained evidence were made to protect people from the excesses of the investigative authority.

Therefore, in principle, they only problematized the illegality of investigations conducted by the police or prosecutors.

"However, even if the investigative authority doesn't directly commit an illegal act, there are many cases where someone's basic rights are violated during the investigation process. For example, if an unrelated person illegally wiretaps my voice or illegally photographs my actions and hands it over to the police."

In this case, the investigative authority hadn't done anything wrong directly.

They had only investigated an item that was submitted voluntarily.

The problem was that the 'voluntary submitter' had obtained the item illegally in the first place.

Wiretapping and illegal photography were crimes in themselves.

The same went for cases where someone stole my property and submitted it as evidence.

If you acknowledged this kind of evidence acquisition, then you wouldn't be able to prevent the violation of basic rights.

In the worst case, there was even the possibility that the investigative authority would secretly instigate individuals to illegally obtain evidence and then use it as if they had received it by chance.

"That's why there is a discussion that evidence that was obtained illegally by a private individual, not by the public authority, should also be seen as illegally obtained evidence. The precedents also state that the ability of the evidence should be determined by comparing and weighing the need for the evidence and the infringed rights."

I waved the photo of the weapon around.

"This weapon is the property of the defendant, Kim Gap-dong. It's an object that he owns after purchasing it with a fair price. The act of stealing private property without permission is, regardless of its purpose, naturally a crime of theft under the Criminal Act, and the evidence that was acquired as a result of such a crime cannot be acknowledged as a voluntarily submitted item."

Like that, even the weapon that had seemed like the most powerful piece of evidence was crossed out from the list of evidence.

Jung Min-shik was speechless, simply staring blankly at my arguments.

"The third piece of evidence is..."

"The fourth piece of evidence as well..."

"This is hearsay evidence, and the defense does not agree to use it as evidence."

Besides that, countless pieces of evidence, things that had been thought of as evidence, were shattered by their respective logic.

Before long, the tower of guilty evidence that had seemed to point so firmly towards Kim Gap-dong's guilt had lost its form and had been disassembled one by one.

It wasn't that I had found out any new facts.

I hadn't called out any witnesses that I hadn't known about beforehand to reveal the truth.

I had just retraced the hints that were included in the provided materials one by one, and pointed out that they were foul cards that violated the 'rules' of the criminal trial game.

With a few ideas, a few words, the entire situation was being completely overturned.

Before long, none of the evidence that was included in the materials could be used to prove Kim Gap-dong's guilt.

Jung Min-shik, who had been staring at the entire situation with lost eyes, barely managed to utter a single word with a trembling voice.

"E, even so."

It was as if he was grabbing onto the last straw.

"The confession, isn't the confession still there!"

It was the last argument that Jung Min-shik could make at this point.

"The defendant, Kim Gap-dong, has already admitted to all of his crimes in the first trial! The record of the first trial, which recorded that, is a document created by the court and is irrefutable evidence!"

That was true.

The defendant, Kim Gap-dong, had already stood in the defendant's seat once and had confessed all of his crimes one by one.

From the method, time, and motive of the murder to everything that a person who wasn't the culprit could never know.

That in itself was powerful evidence.

Since it had been done in court, there were no problems with the procedure, and it was the only piece of evidence that I couldn't deny with logic.

If there was even one piece of evidence that proved guilt, then making a guilty verdict was left solely to the conscience and free judgment of the judge.

Although the probability of getting a guilty verdict was much lower than fighting with dozens of objective pieces of evidence, it wasn't a fight that was impossible.

It was the last move that Jung Min-shik had made.

Faced with that, I.

"I acknowledge it," I said simply, agreeing.

"...?"

"The defendant confessed to all of his crimes in the first trial. I cannot deny that fact. Even if we make different claims now, it's still the same."

But, I said, and nudged Han Seol.

"Huh? Uhh? Me?"

"Yeah, it's your turn."

Actually, this issue was also something that had come up while we were preparing our arguments.

We had put our heads together and worried about how to deal with the only remaining piece of evidence, and it was Han Seol who had found the perfect solution.

'She really is a reliable teammate.'

Therefore, it was right to give her the finishing blow that would cut off the enemy's last breath.

Teamwork and the smooth division of roles could also be reflected in the additional points.

Han Seol had been flustered by being suddenly designated, but since it was a part that she had prepared, she quickly composed herself and cleared her throat.

'Go. Show him how flimsy the straw that he's holding onto is.'

Finally, Han Seol, who had finished her preparations, opened her mouth.