Ex-South Korean First Lady Kim Keon Hee sentenced to 7 years in jail for bribery

A South Korean court on Friday sentenced former first lady Kim Keon Hee to seven years in jail for bribery.

The court found Kim, 53, guilty of accepting "high-value precious metals" in exchange for favours in personnel appointments. The court said she "unhesitatingly accepted valuables of a kind that the average citizen would struggle to acquire even once in a lifetime".

Kim is the wife of disgraced former President Yoon Suk Yeol, who is serving a life sentence over his attempt to impose martial law illegally in the country.

This is Kim's second conviction. In January, she was found guilty of accepting bribes from Unification Church officials in return for political favours and was sentenced to 20 months in jail.

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In the second case in which Kim has now been sentenced, she was found guilty of accepting jewellery worth a total of 103 million won ($67,000) from a construction tycoon in 2022 in exchange for offering to secure a position for his son-in-law. The jewellery Kim accepted included a Van Cleef & Arpels necklace, a Tiffany brooch, and Graff earrings.

Kim was also found guilty of accepting a gold turtle figurine worth 2.65 million won from a politician and a Vacheron Constantin wristwatch worth 39 million won from an entrepreneur.

Throughout the trial, Kim maintained her innocence and said there were no favours attached to these gifts.

Many scandals of ex-first lady

Even before Yoon's conviction, Kim had frequently made headlines and been involved in many scandals over the years.

Kim was previously accused of making more than 800 million won ($552,570) in a price-rigging scheme involving the stocks of Deutsch Motors, a BMW dealer in South Korea, between 2010 and 2012, and of violating campaign financing laws. But the court cleared her of these charges earlier this year.

The scandals go all the way back to Kim's days as a student. Following her graduation with an art education degree from Sookmyung Women's University in 1999, she faced repeated allegations of plagiarism during her time as a student. The university eventually stripped her of her degree in 2025 after a committee concluded that her thesis was indeed compromised.

In 2019, Kim was accused of evading taxes and receiving bribes for hosting art exhibitions through her company Covana Contents. She was eventually cleared of these charges in 2023, but the case was reopened earlier this year.

Ahead of the 2022 presidential election that her husband, Yoon, eventually won, Kim was accused of submitting applications to universities and companies with false academic credentials and accolades.