Gwangju Law Firm | Secured a Non-Referral on a Charge of Defrauding 30 Million Won Paid for Job Placement

The client and the complainant were middle school classmates and had maintained a close friendship for a long time.

One day, the complainant called the client and asked, saying that the complainant had a newly starting business and wanted to be placed as an outsourcing vendor for the client's company.

As it turned out, the complainant had requested the job placement without having a properly established corporation.

Upon learning this, the client refused several times, but at the complainant's earnest request, the client actively helped, even going so far as to lend the client's own corporate business entity.

In the meantime, due to internal circumstances at the client's company, the placement was delayed again and again, and as time passed and the placement did not take place, the complainant unilaterally breached the contract.

The complainant went so far as to claim that the client had intentionally committed fraud, with the intent to defraud, in connection with the 30 million won handed over for job placement.

In the end, in order to recover the amount paid to the client as consideration for the job placement, the complainant filed a complaint, and as a result the client was charged with fraud.

The client explained that they felt betrayed, having actively helped on the basis of the long relationship and trust with the complainant, only to be charged with fraud through the complainant's one-sided claim.

The client's position was that the client had lent the corporate business entity to the complainant and tried to carry out the procedures necessary for the job placement, but the delay occurred only because the complainant's own business procedures were not properly carried out.

<🔗Elements of the Crime of Fraud >

The complainant's side first offered the money under the pretext of arrangement and also first raised the matter of breaking the agreement, but when things did not go well, he instead filed a complaint against the client.

In addition, because the complainant's side requested the arrangement by drawing on the client's ability and position while its corporation was not ready, the attorney argued that the client had in fact actively helped, including by personally preparing the corporation.

The client argued that he had merely received the amount that the complainant's side had first offered, and that there was no reason to return it because the complainant had unilaterally broken the agreement.

When the client stated that, even if he were to return it, he could return only part of it in the form of a penalty for breach, the complainant's side filed the complaint.

On this basis, the absence of any intent to defraud was established.