The judgment of the court below is reversed.

Defendant shall be punished by a fine of KRW 1,000,000.

The above fine shall not be paid by the defendant.

1. The summary of the facts charged in this case is the user who ordinarily employs 50 full-time workers as the representative director of the Gangnam-gu Seoul Building and D Co., Ltd., which is Seoul and run the construction business. The Defendant is a quasi-exclusive contractor who subcontracts the timbering and reinforced concrete construction work among new construction work of apartment houses located in Geumcheon-gu Seoul, Geumcheon-gu, Seoul.

Where a construction business is conducted two or more times under subparagraph 11 of Article 2 of the Framework Act on the Construction Industry, if a subcontractor who is not a constructor under subparagraph 7 of Article 2 of the same Act fails to pay wages (limited to wages generated from the relevant construction works) to his/her workers, the immediate upper tier contractor shall be jointly and severally liable to pay wages to workers employed by the subcontractor.

Nevertheless, the Defendant is employed by E without a construction business license from October 7, 2015 to October 30, 2015.

The retirement G did not pay the total of KRW 6,840,000 of the wages of 13 retired workers within 14 days from the date of retirement, as described in the attached list of crimes, as well as wage 2,40,000 on October 2015 of G, as well as wage 2,40,000.

2. Summary of grounds for appeal;

A. Under the interpretation of Article 44-2 of the Labor Standards Act, the obligation to pay wages to an employee as an immediate upper contractor cannot be deemed exempted on the ground that the contractor paid the contract amount to the contractor.

B. It cannot be deemed that there is a ground to dispute the existence of the obligation to pay wages solely on the ground that the contractor has paid the contract amount to the misunderstanding of facts.

3. Determination

A. The lower court’s judgment cannot be deemed as bearing the responsibility to pay wages under the above provision, even if an immediately upper contractor paid the entire contract amount to the subcontractor, as a matter of the interpretation of Article 44-2 of the Labor Standards Act, and based on the record, the Defendant is E.