A package of drugs arrived at my apartment addressed to my roommate, who's abroad — police questioned me as the recipient. Am I liable for his mail?

Signing for a package does not make you an importer or a possessor of what is inside; Korean law requires knowledge, and a courtesy signature on a flatmate's parcel is not knowledge. What you walked into was a controlled delivery — customs detected the pills, the police let the package proceed to see who received it, and you received it. That makes you the first person in the file, not the culpable one; the police told you exactly what they will now do, which is work out whether the package was yours, his, or a third party's using your address. You do not prove a negative; the investigation proves a positive or it does not, and your phone, which you did not need to worry about, is what will prove it either way. His silence hurts him, and it is the thing most likely to move the police from you to him.

What this is under Korean law

Several hundred MDMA pills is an import of a psychotropic substance under Article 60 of the Narcotics Control Act (마약류관리법, mayangnyu gwalli-beop) — up to ten years' imprisonment or a fine of up to KRW 100 million — and, at that quantity, potentially within the aggravated ranges for trafficking-scale importation. It is a serious case, and it is the case against whoever ordered the package. Import and possession both require that the person knew the substance was a controlled drug and intended to receive or control it; a recipient who did not know is not an importer, and Korean courts have acquitted, and prosecutors have declined to charge, recipients who signed for parcels ordered by others.

Controlled deliveries (통제배달, tongje baedal) are a standard technique: the police observe who accepts, and then examine that person's communications for the order, the payment and the coordination. A recipient with none of those in his phone is a recipient.

Your phone

The police took it to look for the order, the vendor, the tracking number, the payment, messages about the delivery, and anything connecting you to the pills. If those are not there — and on your account they are not — the phone is your best evidence. You are entitled to be present at the forensic examination and to have its scope limited to the offense; counsel asserts that. What you should have counsel review before the second interview is your messages with your roommate: anything about "packages," "picking up," or money that could be read as coordination, so that you can explain it accurately rather than be surprised by it.

Your roommate

He is now the subject of the same investigation, abroad, and unresponsive. The police will examine the package's origin, the vendor's records and his accounts; if the order traces to him, he is the importer and the case against you becomes a witness matter. If he stays abroad, the case against him is suspended with a warrant and an entry flag, and it waits. His silence does not create evidence against you; what would hurt you is your own contact with him now — a message saying "the police took your package" is a warning to a suspect, and it is read as participation. Do not contact him. If he contacts you, do not reply; give the message to your lawyer.

Your situation as a foreign national

A departure suspension (출국정지, chulguk jeongji) is likely to have been requested; you are, for now, a suspect in a large import. It is lifted when the investigation excludes you, which the phone examination and the vendor trace can do within weeks. You are entitled to an interpreter and counsel. A closed case leaves nothing on your D-2; a university is not notified of an investigation. MEGA X handles the criminal case; where it affects your status, we coordinate with an immigration specialist as part of your defense.

What to do now, and what not to do

Retain counsel before the summons. Provide counsel, with your consent, access to your accounts so that your side of the forensic picture is known first. Do not delete anything; do not contact your roommate or anyone who knows him about this. Stop signing for anyone's packages. Prepare your account with your lawyer: the signing habit, the volume of his mail, your summer alone in the apartment, and your negative test.

From a former police investigator's perspective

Controlled deliveries produce a person at a door, and investigators know that person is often not the orderer — which is why they take the phone and say "we will verify." What the investigator needs is a clean phone, a consistent account and a lead to the real orderer; the recipient who gives all three is out of the file. The recipient who warns the roommate has just put himself back in it as an accomplice after the fact, and that is a charge with its own name.

Contact us before the summons and before you reply to anyone — text consultation or +82-2-522-3959.

— MEGA X Law Firm Korea, Criminal Defense Team