U.S. court grants bail to former Lone Star official

A sign of Lone Star at a building in Gangnam District, southern Seoul, in 2006 [YONHAP]

The former Seoul branch chief of Lone Star, who led the U.S. equity fund's controversial acquisition of a Korean bank nearly two decades ago, has been released on bail, the Ministry of Justice said Tuesday.

Steven Lee, a Korean American who headed the branch office from 1998 to 2005, was arrested in New Jersey on March 2, 17 years after the Seoul government had asked the U.S. authorities to extradite him.

The U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey granted bail to Lee last Wednesday, with the condition that he wears an ankle monitor and lives at an address approved by the court, officials said.

The ministry said it will continue to cooperate with authorities so that Lee undergoes an extradition trial.

The Texas-based Lone Star took over the Korea Exchange Bank (KEB) at a below-market price in 2003 and sold it to the Seoul-based Hana Financial Group in 2012, earning a hefty profit from the transaction.

Lee is suspected of playing a key role in dealing with the purchase of KEB through manipulating financial records in collusion with local government officials and financial heavyweights.

Lee is facing charges of breach of trust, embezzlement and tax evasion.

Prosecutors launched a probe into Lee in 2006, but he had already fled to the United States a year prior.

Yonhap