I'm under a departure suspension in Korea for an assault case and my father just died back home — can I get it lifted to attend the funeral?

A departure suspension can be lifted — temporarily, for a defined period, for a defined purpose — and a parent's funeral is the paradigm case for it. The decision is the Immigration Office's, made on the police's or prosecutor's opinion about whether your temporary absence would prejudice the case; the application is made now, with documents, and nine days is enough if it is filed in the next two. Leaving with a lifted suspension and returning on the date does not harm your case; it helps it, because you have demonstrated that you return. Leaving without a lift is not possible, and trying is a mistake.

What the suspension is

A departure suspension (출국정지, chulguk jeongji) is imposed by the Minister of Justice under Article 4 of the Immigration Act (출입국관리법, chulipguk gwalli-beop) on request of an investigating agency, on a person under criminal investigation, for a set period that may be extended. You are not told when it is imposed; you find out at the airport, as you did. It is not a punishment and it is not a finding; it is a hold to keep a suspect available.

Article 4 and its implementing rules provide for lifting (출국정지 해제, chulguk jeongji haeje), including temporary lifting for a specific purpose and period, where the reason for the suspension has ceased or where circumstances warrant it. Family emergencies — a parent's death, a serious illness — are the circumstances the temporary-lifting provision exists for.

Who decides, and on what

The Immigration Office decides, but it asks the agency that requested the suspension — here, the prosecutor's office where your case is pending — whether it objects. That opinion is decisive in practice. The prosecutor is weighing one thing: will you come back. The application therefore has two audiences, and it is built for the prosecutor as much as for immigration.

What it contains: proof of the death and the funeral date — a death certificate and funeral notice from Australia, with a translation; your itinerary with a fixed return date, ideally within a short window after the funeral; your employer's leave approval and confirmation of your continued employment; your lease and other ties in Korea; and a written undertaking to return and to attend any summons. Your lawyer's covering letter addresses the case's status and states that counsel remains on record to receive any decision or summons during your absence. Where a settlement (합의, hapui) with the injured man exists or is in progress, that is included; it tells the prosecutor the case is being resolved, not evaded.

Timing

File within two days. The Immigration Office consults the prosecutor and decides; a well-documented humanitarian application is often decided within days. Book a refundable ticket for a date that gives the process room, and do not go to the airport until the lift is confirmed in writing. A second stop at Incheon, on a suspension you knew about, is the kind of fact a prosecutor remembers.

Leaving, and coming back

A temporary lift specifies a period; return within it. On return, the suspension resumes for the remainder of its term, or is lifted entirely if the case has meanwhile been decided. Re-entry is not affected by the case itself — you hold a valid E-2 and a pending investigation is not an entry ban. The risk is overstaying the lift period, which converts a humanitarian exception into evidence of flight and would be raised against you at every later stage. Return on the date.

Your E-2 is not affected by any of this. A criminal disposition, when it comes, is a fact the Immigration Office may consider; that is separate from the suspension. MEGA X handles the criminal case and the lifting application as part of it; where immigration questions beyond the case arise, we coordinate with an immigration specialist.

What to do now, and what not to do

Today: get the death certificate and funeral notice from your family in Australia, scanned; get the leave approval from your employer in writing; tell your lawyer. Tomorrow: the application goes in, with the undertaking and the itinerary. Do not book a flight for tomorrow and hope. Do not contact the prosecutor's office yourself. Do not post about travelling.

From a former police investigator's perspective

Investigators and prosecutors are asked about funeral lifts regularly, and they agree to most of them — for suspects whose lawyers ask properly, with documents, and whose cases are being handled rather than avoided. What they decline are applications with a vague return date, no employer letter, and a suspect who has previously tried to fly out. Your Japan weekend will be in the file; the application should address it — you did not know — rather than ignore it. The prosecutor is not deciding whether you deserve to grieve; he is deciding whether he will be able to find you afterward. Give him no reason to doubt it.

Nine days is enough. Send us the documents today — text consultation or +82-2-522-3959.

— MEGA X Law Firm Korea, Criminal Defense Team