South Korean police say Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Kun-hee is suspected of evading tax for 8.2 billion won ($A9.6 million), and of using bank accounts held by employees that held 400 billion won, Yonhap News Agency says.
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Police have been investigating alleged misappropriation of company funds used to pay for interior renovations of residences of his and his family's.
A series of scandals have dogged the family of Samsung, the country's biggest business empire.
The chairman's son Jay Y. Lee, heir to the group, was released from a prison earlier this week after an appeals court halved his sentence for bribery and corruption to 2-1/2 years and suspended it for four years.
The elder Lee has been hospitalised since suffering a heart attack in 2014.
Samsung declined comment and police were not immediately available for comment.
In 2009, Lee was convicted and later pardoned for tax evasion after being embroiled in a scandal that he was using so called "borrowed named" accounts held by trusted employees.