With President Yoon Suk Yeol impeached by the National Assembly on Saturday, questions are mounting over whether the presidential compound -- long considered impenetrable to investigators -- might finally face a full-scale raid.

A team of detectives from the National Office of Investigation, tasked with investigating Yoon's short-lived imposition of martial law, attempted to raid the presidential office in Yongsan, Seoul, on Wednesday. However, the NOI special unit, consisting of 60 personnel, found itself stuck outside the gates of the compound after the presidential office refused to admit them.

Despite presenting a warrant, after an eight-hour standoff, the investigators left the gates of the presidential office Wednesday after obtaining a limited volume of materials submitted voluntarily by the presidential office. The NOI previously filed a search warrant naming Yoon as a suspect in an insurrection plot centered on his martial law decree. The targets of the raid included the presidential office, the secretariat, the Cabinet meeting room and the presidential security service.

The presidential office has resisted the search-and-seizure operation by citing Articles 110 and 111 of the Criminal Procedure Act. Article 110 stipulates, "Seizure and search shall not be executed in a place where secret military matters might be endangered without permission of the person in charge." Article 111 states, "In respect to articles held in the custody or possession of a person who is or was a public official, such articles may be seized only with the consent of such public office concerned, or its supervisory office, if the person or the public office to which he belongs or belonged declares that they relate to an official secret."

These laws protect military facilities and areas containing official secrets from search and seizure without the consent of the official in charge -- in this case, Yoon himself.

A raid of South Korea’s presidential compound would be unprecedented. Previous attempts were similarly refused during investigations into former presidents Park Geun-hye, Lee Myung-bak and Moon Jae-in. In all cases, authorities were denied entry to the Blue House, the former presidential office, under the justification of military and official secrecy.

However, with Yoon currently facing charges of insurrection, mutiny and abuse of power for his declaration of martial law on Dec. 3, and having been stripped of his constitutional powers following his impeachment Saturday, legal analysts have suggested that the broader investigation may now proceed more smoothly.

Lim Ji-bong, a professor at Sogang Law School, told local reports that "Because acting authority has shifted to Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, who now holds the responsibility for approving a raid on the presidential office, some of the decisions that previously relied on Yoon’s approval -- such as granting access to certain premises -- may now be more straightforward, potentially making a raid at the presidential office easier to execute."

However, there is still a chance that Han might not cooperate with the investigation. In February 2017, during the investigation into corruption involving a confidante of then-President Park, the Blue House resisted a search-and-seizure attempt by the special prosecution team despite Park's impeachment having suspended her powers.

The special prosecutors at the time requested cooperation from the acting president and Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, but this request was also denied. Ironically, the head of the special team leading that investigation was Yoon, then a top prosecutor.

The NOI announced on Friday at a press briefing that it is considering a second attempt to raid the presidential compound.

“We may attempt another raid before the search warrant expires in seven days,” an NOI official said.

Search warrants in South Korea are typically valid for up to one week or a specified period, during which investigators can execute the warrant and carry out searches. If investigators are unable to complete the search within the warrant's validity, they are required to apply for a new warrant to continue their operations.