The Gyeonggi Bukbu Provincial Police Agency said Wednesday that it requested an arrest warrant in advance for a public employee with the Pocheon city government, charging him with corruption.

It marked the first time an arrest warrant was sought in the government’s interagency investigation into civil servants’ land dealings, which began in the wake of alleged property speculation by employees of the state-run Korea Land and Housing Corporation(LH).

Police also requested a court order to freeze the Pocheon employee’s assets related to a plot of land and building he purchased in the city.

The employee is suspected of purchasing last September a plot measuring some two-thousand-600 square meters and a one-story building near a site that is set to house a Pocheon subway station.

Police suspect the employee made the purchase with insider information that he came across while working on the project to extend the city’s subway line Number Seven.

The employee denied the allegations when he was brought in for questioning last Sunday.