Suwon (South Korea), May 12 (IANS): Police said on Friday that they have decided to refer the brother-in-law of President Yoon Suk Yeol to the prosecution on charges of document falsification connected to an apartment development project by first lady Kim Keon Hee's family-owned firm.

The Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police plans to refer the 53-year-old Kim, the elder brother of the first lady and the de-facto owner of their family-owned firm, ESI&D, to the prosecution for further investigation and potential indictment, along with four other company officials, Yonhap news agency reported.

They are accused of submitting falsified documents to the county government of Yangpyeong, 52 kilometre east of Seoul, in 2016 to win a discount in the development charge that the company had to pay to the country government over the lucrative apartment development project the company carried out in the county's Gongheung district.

Regional governments collect a share of profits earned through property development projects in their regions in the form of development charges.

ESI&D reportedly earned 80 billion won ($60 million) in sales from the 350-unit apartment construction project. Police suspect the accused overstated the project's construction expenditures so as to underreport their profits.

The county of Yangpyeong had initially charged the company 1.75 billion won in the development charge in 2016. Following the firm's two subsequent rounds of appeal, however, the county decided the following year to charge nothing at all.

The case had triggered suspicions of preferential treatments for the Kim family in the run-up to the 2022 presidential election, and the Yangpyeong county belatedly reversed its decision and charged the firm 187 million won.

Civic activists had also filed a complaint against Yoon, the first lady and her mother in connection with the suspicions, but police dismissed accusations against Yoon and Kim only to investigate the President's mother-in-law through written questionnaires.

The mother-in-law is the founder of the family-owned company, while the first lady had once served as an executive at the company. On Friday, police also dropped suspicions against the mother-in-law, saying she resigned as chief of ESI&D before the development project began in earnest.