Joon Hyun Kim is an American attorney who served as the acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York from March 2017 to January 2018. He was Deputy U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York from July 2015 to March 2017 after serving as the chief of the criminal division since July 2014. From April 2013 to July 2014, Kim was the chief counsel to the U.S. Attorney.
Kim joined the U.S. Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York in 2000. As an assistant U.S. attorney, he investigated and prosecuted a wide range of federal crimes including racketeering, murder, money laundering, securities fraud, firearms and narcotics offenses, tax evasion, and terrorism. He spent his prior years in the office in the organized crime and terrorism unit, prosecuting violent organized crime syndicates, including Asian gangs and the Mafia. During his tenure, Kim helped secure convictions of a number of high-ranking organized crime figures including Peter Gotti, boss of the Gambino Family, for conspiring to kill Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano.
Kim rejoined the United States Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York as chief counsel in April 2013. After becoming the chief of its criminal division in July 2014, he was promoted to Deputy U.S. Attorney in July 2015. When Preet Bharara was fired as U.S. Attorney in March 2017, Kim replaced him in an acting capacity, but had to be replaced in January 2018 because of a 300 day limit on acting U.S. attorneys. Kim's term was notable for the continued prosecution of high-profile terrorism cases, pursuing a prison term for Anthony Weiner following his guilty plea to a federal obscenity charge, and for securing the conviction of Mehmet Hakan Atilla, a Turkish banker, on fraud and conspiracy charges in a billion-dollar scheme to help Iran evade American financial sanctions via Turkish banks, despite an investigation of the American prosecutors by the government of Turkey. On November 30, 2017, Kim announced the sentencing of Aharon Goldberg, Shimen Liebowitz and Binyamin Gottlieb, three organizers of the Kiryas Joel murder conspiracy who had tried to force an end to their intended victim's marriage under Jewish marital law.
