The Honorable Justice LEE Kitaik was born in Seoul on July 9, 1959. He passed the 23rd National Judicial Examination in 1981 during his enrollment in the College of Law at Seoul National University and received LL.B. from the University in February, 1982.

Justice Lee’s judgeship started in 1985 as a judge of Seoul Civil District Court, which now changed its name into Seoul Central District Court. His service continued at the National Court Administration, Supreme Court, Patent Court and Seoul High Court. He was appointed as a Supreme Court Justice in September 2015.

As a judge, he decided a number of cases that contributed to the protection of the socially vulnerable and human rights, including a judgment that invalidated a ten-year exclusive contract of an entertainer, a decision on the commencement of retrial for a case on Committee for Re-establishment of the People’s Revolutionary Party and many more. As a presiding judge of Patent Court and Seoul High Court, he made contributions to the practical and theoretical developments of the intellectual property law through rational resolutions of socially important cases such as patent and copyright cases based on his exquisite logic.

During his tenure as Director of Judicial Policy Research, he participated in the drafting and revision processes of the Civil Procedure Act and Civil Execution Act and wrote a number of articles and papers on the Acts.

When serving as the Chief Judge of Seoul Western District Court, he supported raising young legal professionals to be equipped with practical skills, by concluding MOUs with law schools in the jurisdiction to provide credit transfer apprenticeship and summer internship programs for students from the schools.