Samsung boss Lee Jae-yong has been cleared of fraud prices, concluding a decade-long authorized battle over his position in a 2015 merger deal.
Lee, the grandson of Samsung’s founder and the de facto head of the corporate since 2014, had been accused of utilizing inventory and accounting fraud to attempt to acquire management of the agency.
In its ultimate verdict, the South Korean Supreme Court docket upheld a not responsible verdict, after Lee was acquitted of all prices in two earlier trials.
The case drew widespread scrutiny of the expertise large, because the nation grapples with company corruption scandals involving its highly effective family-run conglomerates often known as chaebols.
“In the present day, the Supreme Court docket has clearly confirmed by its ultimate ruling that the merger of Samsung C&T and the accounting remedy of Samsung Biologics have been lawful,” mentioned Samsung’s attorneys on Thursday.
“We sincerely thank the courtroom for its smart judgment following a radical five-year trial course of.”
Lee confronted allegations of fraud within the wake of a merger that led to his succession as Samsung’s boss, after his father Lee Kun-hee suffered a coronary heart assault and was left in a coma in 2014.
In 2024, a district courtroom cleared Lee of all prices linked to the merger of two Samsung subsidiary firms price $8bn (£5.97bn).
Lee was cleared once more after prosecutors appealed the case within the Excessive Court docket.
Authorized battles over the previous decade have added to Samsung’s troubles because it struggles with intensifying competitors.
