1.

A New Criminal Justice System

In March 2026, the National Assembly of Korea enacted the Public Prosecution Office Act and the Act on the Establishment and Operation of the Serious Crimes Investigation Agency (the “SCIA Act”). These two laws abolished Korea’s long-standing Prosecutors’ Office and established two new institutions in its place: the Public Prosecution Office which issues and litigates criminal charges, and the Serious Crimes Investigation Agency (the “SCIA”) which leads investigations into a defined category of grave offenses. Together they represent the country’s most significant criminal justice overhaul in decades.

These statutes brought about a profound change in the institutional landscape of criminal enforcement. At the same time, the advent of these two new agencies left some ambiguity in terms of applicable procedures. Rules about which official may commence an investigation, who may apply to the court for a warrant, and how evidence is gathered and admitted at trial were left unaddressed in the new statutes, warranting a significant update of the Criminal Procedure Act, the general law governing criminal enforcement in Korea.

On July 31, 2026, the National Assembly did exactly that, passing a comprehensive amendment to the Criminal Procedure Act. It was promulgated on August 4, 2026 and takes effect on October 2, 2026 (the same day the Public Prosecution Office Act and the SCIA Act come into force and the previous Prosecutors’ Office Act is repealed), with certain provisions phased in at a later timepoint.
 

2.

Key Reform: Separation of Investigation and Prosecution Functions

To appreciate the amendment, it helps to understand how Korean criminal procedure has traditionally worked. For decades, prosecutors in Korea were among the most powerful actors in the criminal justice system. Prosecutors could open and conduct their own investigations, direct the police, decide whether to seek arrest or search warrants, and ultimately decide whether to bring charges, combining investigative and charging functions within a single office. In the ordinary case, the police would investigate and then “refer” the matter to a prosecutor, who could then conduct further investigations personally before deciding on charges.

The reform’s central premise is the institutional separation of the investigation and prosecution functions: investigations will be conducted by the police (and, for grave offenses, the SCIA), while the newly created Public Prosecution Office will focus on decisions related to the issuance of criminal charges and conducting litigation of cases in court. The amendment of the Criminal Procedure Act is what translates that premise into concrete, enforceable procedural rules.
 

3.

Prosecutors Lose Authority to Investigate

At the heart of the amendment is the deletion of Article 196, the provision that had long served as the legal basis for prosecutors’ general investigative authority. Its removal strips away both the prosecutor’s authority to open investigations directly (for example, by taking cognizance of a suspected crime) and the authority to conduct “supplemental” investigation of cases received from the police. The practical consequences of these reforms, which take effect on October 2, 2026, are far-reaching:
 

• No New Direct Investigations. Public Prosecution Office prosecutors no longer have the authority to initiate their own criminal investigations.

• Transfer of Pending Cases. As a rule, pending investigations which are being conducted by a prosecutor must be transferred to the competent investigative agency. Cases for which the applicable statute of limitations period is nearing expiry, or where continued supervision by a prosecutor is deemed unavoidable, may be retained, but must be concluded within 90 days of the effective date, after which they too must be transferred.

• No Supplemental Direct Investigation. For cases received from the police, the prosecutor can no longer conduct further investigations by themselves. The prosecutor may only request that the police carry out a supplemental investigation.

• Warrant Applications Only At Request of Police. The prosecutor’s constitutionally based power to apply to the court for a warrant survives, but a prosecutor may now apply for warrants only at the request of the police. Prosecutors can no longer seek warrants on their own initiative.
   

Under the new structure, investigation and evidence-gathering functions are more or less exclusively with the police, and the prosecutor’s role has been narrowed to reviewing the case file and deciding whether to issue charges or request supplemental investigation by the police.

The amendment does build in channels for some interaction between prosecutors and police:
 

• The police may ask a prosecutor for a view on legal questions or on the adequacy of evidence-gathering (Article 195(3)). 

• Where a prosecutor sees substantial grounds to suspect a different crime within a referred case file, the prosecutor may ask the police or the competent agency to investigate the same (Article 245-9).

• Under a new “fact-confirmation” mechanism (Article 245-13), a prosecutor would be able to hear from suspects, interested parties, experts, or police officers, and receive written opinions or related materials, in order to decide whether to charge, whether to demand re-investigation, or how to maintain the charges in litigation. However, statements and materials gathered in this manner cannot be used as evidence at trial; the mechanism supports the prosecutor’s decision-making, not the building of the case supporting the charges.
   

The limits on detention of suspects remain unchanged: the police may hold a suspect for up to 10 days, and the prosecutor may do the same for up to a further 10 days to decide on charges, extendable once by an additional 10 days (Articles 202, 203, 205).
 

4.

Supplemental Investigations

As prosecutors can no longer investigate referred cases themselves under the new system, a significant focus will be on supplemental investigation requests made by prosecutors to the police. Critics have warned that this could bog down cases with loops of referrals and requests made between the police and prosecutors. This phenomenon has already been seen since supplemental investigation requests were first introduced in 2020, and it has been faulted for causing delays when requests accumulate or when prosecutors and police disagree on the case outcome.

The amendment attempts to address these concerns by setting out detailed rules governing supplemental investigations:
 

• The grounds on which a prosecutor may request supplemental investigation are spelled out more concretely.

• Upon receiving a request, the police must, as a rule, complete the supplemental investigation within one month.

• There is no limit on how many times a prosecutor may request a supplemental investigation.

• Where it is reasonable to expect that a proper supplemental investigation by the original police unit cannot be conducted, the prosecutor may direct the request to a different department, such as a higher police office or another investigative agency such as the SCIA (Article 197-2(8)).
   

5.

Police Authority to Close Cases

The 2020 reforms gave the police authority to close cases on their own. The police would refer a case to the prosecution only where they find grounds for criminal charges. Otherwise, the police would issue a non-referral decision. The amendment maintains this system (Article 245-5) but tightens the timelines around this process.
 

• If the police decision to not refer a case or suspend an investigation is unlawful or improper, the prosecutor may demand a re-investigation, and the police must, as a rule, complete that re-investigation within three months (Article 245-8).

• Complainants who receive a non-referral decision previously faced no deadline to object. Now they must, as a rule, file any objection within three months of being notified (Article 245-7(3)).

• Separately, complainants may now raise a formal objection with the head of the investigating office where a police investigation has lasted for six months or more, or where there has been a rights violation or unlawful or improper conduct (Article 245-11).
   

For complainants and victims, these are meaningful new avenues of redress. The new deadline cuts the other way too. Capping the objection period reduces the risk that a suspect remains indefinitely under a cloud after a case has been closed.
 

6.

Special Judicial Police

Historically, special judicial police officers (who are embedded in agencies such as customs, labor authorities, the Financial Services Commission, and local governments) were subject to prosecutorial supervision in all of their investigations. The amendment abolishes this arrangement. Going forward, special judicial police officers will conduct their investigations independently. They may seek guidance or advice from a prosecutor, and a prosecutor may offer it where needed (Article 245-10).
 

7.

Controls on Police Investigation Authority

Concentrating investigative authority in the police naturally raises the question of oversight, and the amendment responds with several new controls, most of which are phased in one year after promulgation (Addenda Articles 1 and 5):
 

• Complete Electronic Record. Korea began recognizing electronic documents as originals in criminal procedures starting in October 2024, and case files are currently a transitional mix of paper and electronic records. The amendment requires that all investigation-related documents and evidence be recorded and registered in the criminal justice information system in chronological order, with nothing omitted, strengthening electronic case management (Article 199-2).

• Mandatory Video Recording of Searches. When police carry out a seizure, search, or verification under a warrant, they must now video-record the entire process from start to finish (Article 220-2), widening the ability to test whether compulsory measures were lawfully conducted.

• Recording of Interviews on Request. Recording a suspect’s questioning used to be at the investigating agency’s discretion. Now, if the suspect or defense counsel requests it, recording the questioning is mandatory (Article 244-6).
    

8.

Criminal Litigation

Two changes at the trial stage deserve particular attention:
 

• Public Prosecution Office Prosecutors’ Interview Transcripts Not Admissible as Evidence. An interview transcript is the formal written record of a suspect’s or witness’s answers during questioning. Because Public Prosecution Office prosecutors will no longer conduct investigations, the provision that set the conditions for admitting prosecutor-prepared transcripts into evidence has been removed, leaving no statutory basis.

• New Grounds to Dismiss Charges. A court may now dismiss charges where they “were issued on the basis of a serious unlawful investigation” or “were issued in significant deviation from prosecutorial discretion” (Article 327). The precise scope and standards for these grounds will be worked out through future court decisions, so the developing case law will be worth following closely.
   

9.

Analysis

This amendment does far more than reshuffle authority. It re-engineers who drives a criminal case and how it is conducted. Prosecutors lose the power to investigate; the police become the unified investigative authority. The roles of prosecutors, police, and special judicial police, together with procedural safeguards over compulsory measures, have been recalibrated across the board. For companies and individuals exposed to criminal risk in Korea, the impact will be substantial.

A few notable points are as follows:
 

• Early Investigation Stage Is Decisive. With prosecutors no longer able to investigate or personally re-work a case, the initial response before the police, special judicial police, and the SCIA carries far more weight than before, particularly in corporate matters such as capital-markets and other financial and economic offenses, fair-trade cases, and serious-accident and industrial-safety cases. Engaging experienced criminal counsel early, ideally before an investigation is even underway, is more important than ever.

• Advocacy Before the Prosecutor Still Matters. Submissions to Public Prosecution Office prosecutors, and advocacy around the decision on whether to issue charges, remain important even though the prosecutor now works largely on the basis of the case file.

• New Timelines and Rights Reshape Strategy. With the objection period against police non-referral now fixed at three months, and with expanded procedural rights for complainants and victims (including objections to investigative delay), both those seeking redress through complaints and those defending against them will need strategies that make full use of the new procedures and deadlines to protect their interests.

• Expanded Trial Defense Strategies. The new dismissal grounds under Article 327 introduce both significant risk and a key defensive opportunity. Because procedural flaws during initial police search-and-seizure protocols, interrogations, or evidence handling can now lead directly to dismissals at trial, careful scrutiny of investigative compliance from the earliest stages is crucial, underscoring the importance of seeking proper legal guidance to navigate and evaluate these complex procedural challenges.
   

Given the scale of these changes to Korea’s core criminal justice institutions, we will continue to monitor how the new provisions are interpreted and applied, and will keep you informed of the legal issues and practical implications as they unfold.