War of heirs at LG: Adopted son makes a spectacular fake will to take inheritance from mother and 2 biological daughters of late LG chairman Koo Bon-moo!
As an adopted son, the current LG Chairman inherited all of his assets and took over Korea’s leading corporation. From here, an underground fight began.
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As a leading empire worth 10 billion USD in Korea, LG is operated by the male ideology like many other chaebols. A successor was arranged 14 years ago, when Mr. Koo and his wife adopted their eldest grandson Koo Kwang-mo.
But the late LG Chairman Koo Bon-moo passed away at the age of 73 without leaving a will. As a result, conflict broke out within the family, related to the inheritance of assets worth 1.5 billion USD, including 11% of LG shares.
Five years after the death of the late LG Chairman, his wife Kim and two daughters filed a lawsuit against Koo Kwang-mo. They accused him and other directors of lying to steal their inheritance and consolidate power at the corporation.
Koo Bon-moo’s wife and children said that they just want to inherit all the assets, not needing control of LG. The lawsuit was more than just the overthrow of one of the country’s most influential business figures. but also challenges LG’s patriarchal ideology by only allowing the eldest son to hold power, while the female gender in the family is always the last choice, said the New York Times.
In recordings of secret conversations attached to legal documents, Koo Kwang-mo begged his adoptive mother not to claim his inheritance. That would damage LG’s image and leadership, tarnishing his reputation before the Korean public.
“The scariest thing is public opinion. They will think that I am greedy and do not take good care of my mother,” Koo Kwang-mo said in the recording.
Not only that, the female alliance in the family also accused Ha Beom-jong – former assistant to the late Chairman and currently LG’s Chief Financial Officer – of deceiving them into believing that there was an inheritance will for Koo. Kwang-mo. According to Korean law, if there is no will, the wife inherits 1/3 of the property, with the remainder divided equally between her two daughters and Kwang-mo. Because of being deceived, Mrs. Kim and her two daughters had to watch 75% of their assets fall into the hands of their adopted son.
“We cannot tolerate our rights protected under the constitution and law being disregarded just because we are women,” Ms. Kim confided.
The will was fake but the inheritance came true
Speaking to the New York Times, mother and son said that after Mr. Koo passed away, Kwang-mo’s biological father and LG officials hired locksmiths to open his safes in his office and vacation home.
After that, Mr. Ha – who used to be Koo Bon-moo’s assistant – went to the family villa in Seoul, saying that the Chairman had left a will. Specifically, Mr. Koo wants all of his shares and chairmanship to be transferred to his adopted son because this is in accordance with family tradition since the founding of LG.
“The person my father trusted the most came to us and said there was a will saying it would all go to Kwang-mo,” said eldest daughter Koo Yeon-kyung. However, in court, Mr. Ha denied ever saying he had a will.
The late LG Chairman with his wife, eldest daughter and adopted son Kwang-mo at an event. Photo: LG.
Assistant Mr. Koo Bon-moo confirmed that there was no will. In reality, it was just a note recording his last words and signed a few days before the first surgery. But it was shredded due to the company’s routine document destruction process.
Mr. Ha said he gave it to Koo and Kwang-mo’s mother and son right after the former LG Chairman passed away. But the wife was sure that they had never seen it.
Mrs. Kim said that she was asked to give up all the shares inherited from her husband to ensure Kwang-mo’s succession rights, while not giving her late husband’s brother a chance to usurp the throne. Finally, Kwang-mo agreed to divide about 1/5 of Mr. Koo Bon-moo’s shares, worth about 270 million USD, to his two sisters.
Eldest daughter Yeon-kyung said she was required to keep the terms of the inheritance as secret as possible, to the point that she was not allowed to tell her husband or consult a lawyer. She and her mother had heard about the agreement once but never received any copies.
Thanks to this agreement, his adopted son Kwang-mo smoothly stepped into the chairman’s seat. Before Koo Bon-moo passed away, Kwang-mo owned 6.1% of LG’s shares. Mr. Koo Bon-joon, the late chairman’s brother and interim company manager, holds 7.6%. After inheriting most of his adoptive father’s shares, Kwang-mo’s shares increased to about 15%. He became Chairman of LG in June 2018.
The secret of the battle for position was revealed
As for mother and daughters, they continue to live a normal life. Eldest daughter Yeon-kyung studies social work. Remembering her father’s wish to participate in running LG’s charitable funds, she started working at one of the funds as a consultant in 2021.
But that moment is also when everything broke down. Yeon-kyung can’t sign up for a store credit card to get a discount when buying a gift for a friend. She was rejected because she owed too much. At that time, Yeon-kyung realized that she and her mother knew too little about the group’s financial situation.
After working with each bank one by one, she learned that the huge inheritance tax and LG stock loan were nothing like the initial commitment that her adopted brother Kwang-mo would pay it all. LG’s new chairman also received more cash and investment assets than they thought.
“Isn’t it strange, the money is ours but we don’t know how much we have,” Yeon-kyung said.
Keeping her suspicions growing, Yeon-kyung began secretly recording conversations with Kwang-mo and former assistant Ha in 2022. In January 2023, Kwang-mo sent his adoptive mother a letter to clarify the withdrawal of money from her account for unknown reasons.
LG’s chairman said that he was unaware that the “employees” were lacking money to pay inheritance tax in his name. Therefore, they used Mrs. Kim’s name to repay the debt and planned to pay it back later. However, he still asked her not to claim her inheritance.
As for Kwang-mo, his legal representative also confirmed that inheritance rights are a “legally resolved issue” that was resolved 4 years ago. The adoptive mother also signed a document agreeing that Kwang-mo would receive LG’s shares and assets related to the management of the company. “Anyone who wants to shake LG’s tradition and executive authority will not be tolerated,” LG said in a statement.
