South Korea's police are pouring resources into expanding their investigative workforce to confront recent criticism of their investigative capacity and to settle the newly revised Criminal Procedure Act into practice. The move is seen as an attempt to stabilize the organization under the changed criminal justice system by deploying large numbers of specialized investigators to the field, in anticipation of a heavier workload for officers on the investigative track as supplementary investigations increase. Yet only a handful of senior police officials have professional experience on the investigative track, raising concerns that the gap between frontline practice and the command leadership will widen further.
The Korean National Police Agency said on the 20th that it will assign 2,100 investigators to investigative units in the second half of this year. Police had already added 1,907 investigators to those units in the first half. The deployment prepares for a surge of major cases and prosecutors' requests for supplementary investigation before the prosecution service is dismantled and the Serious Crimes Investigation Agency is launched in October. Whether the increase in numbers will translate into a real gain in investigative capacity remains uncertain. Few of the 2,100 officers being added in the second half are seasoned investigators, and most are being reassigned from other tracks, such as riot police units.
Separate from questions about the capability of the added personnel, the concern voiced most often inside the force is the investigative experience of its senior officials. Among the current leadership in key police posts, officers known as investigation specialists are so scarce as to be all but absent. As a stark example, of the seven posts at the rank of chief superintendent general — the No. 2 tier of the police organization — two are vacant, the commissioner of the Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency and the president of the Korean National Police University. Not one of the five officers holding the remaining posts is classified as being on the investigative track. Kim Jong-cheol, the agency's deputy commissioner general who is serving as acting head of the police, has served as chief of the autonomous police bureau, the public safety bureau and the community safety bureau. He is regarded as having had few chances to work in investigations since his promotion to senior superintendent, apart from stints as head of frontline police stations. Ko Beom-seok, commissioner of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency, which handles public safety in the capital, has also worked mainly in tracks such as inspection, autonomous policing and security operations. Yoo Seung-ryeol, commissioner of the Incheon Police Agency, is likewise a specialist in intelligence and planning.
The biggest problem is the lack of investigative experience at the top of the National Office of Investigation, the core of police investigative work. Hong Seok-ki, appointed as its chief in July, previously served as head of the agency's traffic operations and planning divisions, as chief of the public safety bureau at the Chungnam Provincial Police Agency and as senior cyber investigation officer at the agency. He led the investigation bureau at the National Office of Investigation immediately before his appointment as chief, but that post began only with his promotion to senior superintendent general in September last year and lasted less than a year. Kim Sung-hee, who has served as commissioner of the Busan Police Agency since April, is also known to have worked mainly in planning areas, including autonomous policing.
This marks a sharp departure from the atmosphere before the latest round of promotions to chief superintendent general. Yoo Jae-sung, who was then deputy commissioner general, was a textbook investigation specialist, having served as head of the agency's investigation planning division, as head of its forensic science management office, and as chief of the cyber investigation bureau and the criminal investigation bureau at the National Office of Investigation. Park Jung-bo, the former Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency commissioner, was a seasoned investigative expert who served as head of the agency's special investigation division and of the Seoul agency's cyber safety division, as investigation chief at the Gwangju and Gangwon provincial police agencies and as deputy commissioner for investigations in Seoul. Park Sung-joo, the previous head of the National Office of Investigation, also handled investigations at the Seoul and Gwangju agencies and at the National Office of Investigation.
Police, facing criticism over their investigative capacity and set to compete with the Serious Crimes Investigation Agency over investigative authority from October, are belatedly scrambling to strengthen that capacity by adding investigators and taking other steps. But concerns are being raised that the senior appointments, far from reflecting a focus on investigations, are instead more concentrated in planning, security operations and community safety than the previous round was.
Officials also point out that even below the top tier of chief superintendent general, experts who have devoted their careers to investigations are few. Among senior officials at the rank of senior superintendent general in key posts at the police agency and its National Office of Investigation, Bae Dae-hee, chief of the security investigation bureau, stands out as one who has come through the investigative track. As criticism of the shortage of investigative expertise persisted, police moved two officials to the National Office of Investigation in the latest senior reshuffle: Kim Kwang-sik as investigation planning coordinator and Oh Seung-jin as head of the investigation bureau. At the Seoul agency, investigative experts at the rank of senior superintendent or above can be counted on one hand, including Song Byung-sun, deputy commissioner for investigations, a senior superintendent general, and Park Chan-woo, head of the metropolitan investigation unit, a senior superintendent. The outcome was foreseeable from the moment in April when, among 28 senior superintendents promoted to senior superintendent general, several leading figures on the criminal and investigative tracks who had been seen as strong candidates lost out to participants in the senior superintendents' meeting. At that time, no promotions went to the Seoul agency's metropolitan investigation unit, or to organizations that have handled major investigations, such as the metropolitan investigation squads, criminal task forces and anti-corruption and public crime investigation squads at each provincial police agency.
With the work already more demanding than in other tracks and incentives such as promotion now gone, more officers are giving up the investigative track amid complaints that the leadership understands little of investigative practice. Prosecutors' requests for supplementary investigation reached about 76,000 through July this year, up roughly 14,000 from the same period last year, intensifying the workload. As a result, 633 officers voluntarily relinquished their investigative track designation this year, already exceeding the annual totals for 2024, at 616, and 2025, at 565. The National Office of Investigation said preference for the investigative track has risen internally, with 10,296 officers applying for the July selection exam, up 21% from a year earlier. But officers without practical investigative experience are expected to need time before they can handle the work properly.
Complaints are pouring out of frontline police stations. An officer on the investigative track at a Seoul police station said it is all but impossible to handle the flood of investigative work simply by shifting riot police personnel into investigative units, and criticized the outcome as the result of years in which the government and the leadership slighted the investigative track. A senior officer on the investigative track said investigation and criminal work are the most basic functions of policing, and asked who would want to join a unit with a heavy workload and no incentives such as promotion. Real measures are needed, the officer said, such as appointing large numbers of investigative specialists to senior posts, rather than merely paying lip service to the importance of investigative police, so that the benefits trickle down.
