A string of scandals and luxury handbags: Who is South Korea's former first lady?

Two Chanel handbags, a BMW dealership and a controversial church were at the centre of a trial faced by South Korea’s former first lady, Kim Keon Hee.

The wife of disgraced former president Yoon Suk Yeol, she was arrested in August over a raft of charges including bribery, stock manipulation, and political interference – all of which she denies.

Prosecutors had accused Kim, 52, of making more than 800 million won ($552,570; £404,050) by participating in a price-rigging scheme involving the stocks of Deutsch Motors, a BMW dealer in South Korea, between October 2010 and December 2012.

She was also accused of accepting luxury bags, a diamond necklace and other gifts worth up to 80m won as bribes from the controversial Unification Church in exchange for business favours, and receiving 58 free opinion polls, worth 270 million Korean won, from political broker Myung Tae-kyun before the 2022 presidential election.

On Wednesday, a court found her guilty of accepting bribes from Unification Church officials, sentencing her to 20-months in jail.

However, she was cleared on charges of stock price manipulation and violating South Korea’s campaign financing laws. There are still two cases against her that the court is set to hear in future months.

The verdict comes less than a fortnight after her husband was sentenced to jail for abusing power and obstructing justice in relation to his failed martial law bid.

It also marks the first time in history that a presidential spouse has been indicted while detained.

But it is far from the first time Kim herself has been embroiled in controversy.

Before she was South Korea’s first lady, Kim Keon Hee – born Kim Myeong-sin – was a businesswoman and art lover.

She graduated with an art education degree from Sookmyung Women’s University in 1999, but would later face repeated allegations of plagiarism over her time as a student there – leading the university to annul her degree in 2025 after its research ethics panel found her thesis was compromised.

She has never commented on these allegations publicly.

In 2009, she founded art exhibition company Covana Contents, for which she is still CEO and president – but in 2019 South Korean media reported that she had allegedly evaded paying taxes and received kickbacks for hosting art exhibitions.

Kim, who has stood down from her role, was cleared of these charges in 2023, but the special counsel is currently re-examining the case.

Then, ahead of the 2022 presidential election which her husband ultimately won, allegations emerged that Kim had submitted applications to universities and companies containing false qualifications and awards, sparking a scandal over potentially fabricated credentials.

In response to these allegations, which some opposition members had sought to use as a political cudgel against Yoon, Kim issued a public apology for what she described as “exaggerations” on her resume.

She further pledged that if her husband became president she would “focus solely on my role as his wife”.

It is her conduct while in that role, however, that has drawn some of the fiercest backlash.

In late-2023, spy camera footage surfaced showing Kim receiving a luxury handbag from an individual in a Seoul office in September 2022.

The footage was reported to have been secretly filmed by the pastor Choi Jae-young using a camera embedded in his watch – and its publication intensified public scrutiny on both Kim and Yoon.

It appeared to show Mr Choi walking to a store to purchase the greyish-blue calfskin bag, with a receipt putting its cost at 3 million won ($2,200; £1,800). Mr Choi then visits Covana Contents, a company in Seoul owned by the first lady, where Ms Kim then asks the pastor: “Why do you keep bringing me these things?”

South Korean law makes it illegal for public officials and their spouses to receive gifts worth more than 1 million won in one go, or a total of 3 million won within a fiscal year.

And while the video did not explicitly show Ms Kim accepting the gift, the Korea Herald reported at the time that the presidential office confirmed receipt of the bag and said that it was “being managed and stored as a property of the government”.

The presidential office did not immediately respond to the coverage, further fuelling the controversy, as civic groups filed complaints with the prosecution citing potential violations of the Anti-Graft Act.

This incident was one of 16 allegations looked into by the special counsel team, 12 of which were passed to police for further investigation.

Wednesday’s verdict, however, focused on Kim allegedly accepting other bribes from the Unification Church, as well as her alleged involvement in Deutsch Motors stock manipulation and alleged election meddling.

Kim denied the charges – although she did admit to receiving Chanel bags, which she says she later returned without using.

Prosecutors had last month called for a 15-year prison term and a fine of 2 billion won, saying she had “stood above the law” and colluded with the Unification Church to undermine the “constitutionally mandated separation of religion and state”.

While Kim’s string of scandals cast a shadow over her husband’s presidential career, it was Yoon himself who ultimately sealed his own fate as one of South Korea’s most disgraced former leaders.

On 16 January, Yoon was found guilty of abuse of power, falsifying documents and obstructing justice when he tried and failed to impose martial law in the country in 2024. He has also been sentenced to five years in jail.

It was the first of the verdicts in four trials linked to Yoon’s shock martial law decree. Although short-lived, the move triggered nationwide turmoil, sparking protests as MPs rushed to the national assembly to overturn Yoon’s decision.

Yoon’s actions “plunged the country into political crisis”, a judge said while delivering the verdict, noting that Yoon had “consistently shown no remorse”.

It was during a year-long probe into Yoon’s failed martial law attempt that special prosecutors started investigating many of the allegations against Kim.

Together, the once-powerful-couple make a historic pair: while South Korea has a history of former presidents being indicted and imprisoned, Yoon and Kim mark the first time both a former president and former first lady have been jailed.