"I work for the new agency, but this is my first time at the office."
On the morning of Sept. 29, three days before the launch of the Major Crimes Investigation Agency, three men stepped out of a taxi and said this to a security guard standing near the parking lot before entering the building that will house both the agency's headquarters and its Seoul office. Staff assigned to the new agency have begun reporting to work one by one at Rene Square in Seoul's Jung-gu district, but the building still needed work both inside and out.
A screen in the elevator still read "test operation," and the Rene Square logo remained on the windows. That morning, supplies such as cables and foil had arrived by courier delivery, and bags of cement for construction at the first-floor retail space were stacked nearby. Officials were even holding a meeting on building systems at a nearby cafe while reviewing floor plans. Were it not for the sign at the main entrance and the placard set up outside, it would have been hard to tell at a glance that this building was the Major Crimes Investigation Agency, just days from opening.
Inside, the disarray was equally apparent. On the 1st, the day before the opening, work was still underway on the automatic doors on the third floor, which the headquarters and the Seoul office will use. A large office on the opposite side had desks and computers in place, but power strips and cables were scattered about and needed organizing. In one corner of the office, an employee was clearing away empty boxes. A building manager said, "Many of the staff are already reporting to work, but interior construction is only about halfway done."
Major construction work — including bidding for construction supervision services covering the building, mechanical and fire safety systems at the agency's headquarters and Seoul office — has only just begun. The firm that will carry out the supervision work is to be selected on the 8th, a week after the official opening. The supervising firm's contract period runs 90 days, through early next year, meaning agency investigators could end up questioning suspects while construction and supervision work continues around them.
Separately, on the 1st, a day before the agency's opening, a request for a confirmation hearing on Kim Ji-yong, the nominee for agency chief and a graduate of the 28th class of the Judicial Research and Training Institute, was being prepared for submission to the National Assembly. Jeon Jong-min, a 24th-class graduate and attorney at the law firm Kn, was named the agency's first deputy chief, and Choi Jae-min, a 30th-class graduate and former head of the inspection division at the Seoul High Prosecutors' Office, was named head of the Seoul office. Assignments for all investigators at grade 1 and 2 and below were also finalized as of that day, resolving personnel concerns that had been raised earlier. Still, the transfer of cases initiated by the prosecution is expected to take some time given the agency's limited infrastructure.
