A high-level Korean executive from LG Display Co. has agreed to plead guilty and serve a year in jail in the United States for masterminding a global conspiracy to fix the prices of LCD panels in TVs and computers.
Executive vice president of sales and marketing Bock Kwon will serve a 12-month prison sentence in America and pay a $30,000 (£20,500) criminal fine.
This is on top of the $400 million (£275 million) criminal fine (the second largest anti-trust fine ever) LG was sentenced to pay after being found guilty of conspiring to fix prices of its TFT-LCD screens with other manufacturers.
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"The participants in the LCD conspiracy committed a serious fraud upon consumers by fixing the prices of a product that is in almost every American home," said Christine Varney, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Department of Justice's Antitrust Division.
Investigations into the LCD industry have so far resulted in over $616 million (£420 million) in criminal fines being imposed, and four individuals have pleaded guilty and have been sentenced to serve jail time.
The other companies involved in the price-fixing cartel were Sharp, Chunghwa and Hitachi.
