Seoul: The Supreme Court on Thursday overturned a previous court decision requiring SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won to pay approximately 1.4 trillion won (US$986 million) in property division to his estranged wife. This ruling marks a significant development in what is considered the largest divorce settlement case in South Korea.
According to Yonhap News Agency, the Supreme Court remanded the case to the lower court for further examination, highlighting issues related to the property division between Chey, the chairman of South Korea’s second-largest conglomerate, and Roh Soh-yeong. In a previous ruling in May last year, the Seoul High Court ordered Chey to pay 1.38 trillion won in property division along with 2 billion won in alimony to Roh, who is the only daughter of former President Roh Tae-woo.
The Supreme Court pointed out that the lower court’s recognition of the former president’s financial support of 30 billion won to Chey’s father should not be considered as part of the younger Roh’s contribution to the property division. However, the court upheld the 2 billion won alimony for Roh, noting no issues with the amount.
The divorce case originally began in 2015 when Chey publicly announced his intention to divorce, revealing an extramarital relationship and a child born from it, and subsequently filed for a divorce settlement in 2017. Chey and Roh were married in 1988 and have three children together. In response, Roh filed a countersuit in 2019, seeking roughly half of the SK shares owned by Chey as part of the property division.
In December 2022, the Seoul Family Court initially ruled for Chey to pay 100 million won in alimony and 66.5 billion won in cash for the property division. The appellate court later assessed the couple’s combined wealth at 4 trillion won, assigning a division rate of 65 percent for Chey and 35 percent for Roh, taking into account the contributions to SK Group attributed to the former president and his daughter.
Chey challenged this ruling, arguing there were miscalculations regarding Roh’s contributions to the growth of the company.