Lee Jae-yong, Samsung Heir, Is Arrested on Bribery Charges -
SEOUL, South Korea — The de facto leader of Samsung, Lee Jae-yong, was arrested Friday on bribery charges, a dramatic turn in
South Korea’s decades-old struggle to end collusive ties between the government and powerful family-controlled conglomerates.
Mr. Lee, 48, was accused of paying $36 million in bribes to President Park Geun-hye’s secretive confidante, Choi Soon-sil, in return for political favors from Ms. Park, like government support for a merger of two Samsung affiliates in 2015
that helped Mr. Lee inherit corporate control from his incapacitated father, Chairman Lee Kun-hee.
Mr. Lee, the vice chairman of Samsung, one of the world’s largest conglomerates, was taken to a jail outside Seoul,
the capital, soon after a judge at the Seoul Central District Court issued an arrest warrant early Friday.
