SOUTH KOREA Law and Practice Contributed by: Jeena Kim, Kyunghwan Lee, Eunyoung Row and Bochan Kim, Bae, Kim & Lee LLC
Article 14(2) of the Specific Economic Crimes Act This article provides that the above offender and the enterprise in which the offender acts as a representative or executive is prohibited from obtaining any licence, registration or authorisa - tion in connection with government-licensed businesses for a certain period of time. Under specific business sector regulations that restrict giving or accepting benefits, the relevant individual and/or business operator may be sub - ject to licence revocation or suspension. For example, under Article 36(1)(10) of the Medical Devices Act, the relevant authorities may revoke a licence for manufacture, importation or sale if the manufacturer, importer or distributor has committed illegal rebates against healthcare professionals. 5.2 Guidelines Applicable to the Assessment of Penalties The Sentencing Commission affiliated with the Supreme Court of Korea establishes separate sentencing guidelines for individual offences. The guidelines outline mitigating, standard and aggravating sentencing ranges, enabling judges to determine an appropriate sentencing range by adjusting the range and then deciding on a final sentencing period. Specifically, the sentencing guidelines for brib - ery offences provide for different ranges of sen - tences based on the amount of the bribe. For example, if the amount of the bribe received is between KRW50 million and KRW100 mil - lion, the basic sentencing range is five to seven years; the mitigated range is three years and six months to six years, and the aggravated range is six to eight years.
The movement within the sentencing range and the specific sentence selected within the range are determined by considering mitigating and aggravating factors. Repeated offences (recidi - vism) are an aggravating factor that increases the sentence.
6. Disclosure Processes 6.1 Disclosure Obligations
There is no legal obligation on individuals and/or companies to disclose violations of anti-bribery and anti-corruption provisions of which they become aware. 6.2 Voluntary Disclosure Incentives See 4.5 Safe Harbour or Amnesty Programme . 6.3 Self-Disclosure Procedures This topic is not applicable. 6.4 Protections Afforded to Whistle- Blowers The ACRC Act and the Graft Act include pro - visions for protecting and incentivising whis - tle-blowers in cases of bribery and corruption, including those reporting corruption-related issues. Specifically, the ACRC Act contains provisions designed to protect whistle-blowers, which are mirrored in the Graft Act. By way of illustra - tion, the following provisions are included in the ACRC Act. Protection Measures A reporting person may file an application for protection with the ACRC.
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