The woman who risked her life to bring down Li Shengli's people

South wind window

2024-05-25 09:30Posted on the official account of Guangdong Nanfeng Window

Author | Nanfeng window reporter Zhang Qian

Edit | Ah Shu

After 4 years, the sexual exploitation and abuse committed by a group of former Hallyu stars have returned to the public eye.

Recently, the documentary "Burning Sun: Revealing the Secrets of Hallyu Celebrity Chat Rooms" was launched on the Internet, revealing more inside stories and more shocking truths about the chat rooms of Korean celebrities such as Lee Seung Seung (member of BIGBANG), Jung Joon Young (well-known rock singer), and Choi Jong Hoon (former captain of FTIsland).

For the first time, it became known that the women who went to the Burning Sun nightclub in Gangnam-gu, Seoul, were treated as pond fish by Lee Shengli and his VIP customers, and once targeted, the "VIPs" tried to take them to private rooms and stun them with rape drugs. And the police on the street have been bought off and never enter the store to intervene. Then, these well-dressed stars in the entertainment industry showed off and humiliated their prey in online chat rooms.

For the first time, people also know that in the process of finding out which senior police official provided the umbrella for Lee Shengli and his gang, K-Pop actress Goo Hara, who committed suicide in November 2019, took the initiative to contact reporter Kang Kyung-yoon and provided key help.

Gu Hora

"I'm also a victim of pornography revenge for clandestine filming," said Goo Hara when she called reporters.

Similarly, it was known for the first time that during the investigation, Park Hyo-sil, the first reporter to report on Jung Joon-young's sex crimes, was subjected to death threats and physical harassment by his fans during pregnancy, and once had a nervous breakdown, had difficulty getting out of the house, had two miscarriages, and still has no children of his own. Another journalist, Kang Kyung-yoon, was subjected to almost equal levels of harassment and online violence.

It was two female journalists, Kang Kyung-yoon from SBS and Park Hyo-sil from Seoul Sports Daily, who played a key role in unraveling the shocking scandal in the entertainment industry.

01 KakaoTalk对话群组

The fuse of the investigation came from a girl who was also a victim of a sneak peek of erotic revenge.

As early as September 23, 2016, reporter Park Hyo-sil received a wire report that singer Jung Joon-young was prosecuted by his girlfriend Kyung-mi (pseudonym) for illegal filming. Jing Mei found out on the spot that she was secretly filmed by Jung Jun Young, and called the police because she was worried that the video might be disseminated.

Reporter Park Hyo-sil

When questioned by the police, Zheng Junying was worried that the police would recover the deleted information in his mobile phone for evidence, and after consulting with his lawyer, he did not hand over the phone to the police, but sent it to a private identification company, leaving a huge foreshadowing.

The police investigation was rather sloppy, requiring only a report from the company and closing the case in a hurry.

Subsequently, the recording of Zheng Junying's lawyer pressuring the appraisal company was exposed, and the lawyer said: "We talked to the police, and they will be there soon, and the reason I called is because it (mobile phone data) can be recovered, which is not important to us at all, but the police should say that it cannot be recovered, and this is just an unnecessary case." ”

On September 25, Zheng Junying's agency at the time held an emergency press conference for him, and he claimed that he was involved in a sex scandal, but it was just a misunderstanding, and it was "a joke between the two." He believes that as long as he realizes that he is innocent, all the controversy will eventually pass, and then splashes dirty water on the victim Jingmei - his ex-girlfriend.

On September 25, 2016, Zheng Junying's agency at the time held an emergency press conference for him

On October 6, prosecutors announced that Zheng Junying's clandestine filming was not established and ruled that he was not suspected. Subsequently, the pressure of public opinion was all turned to Park Hyo-sil reporter and the media, and Park Hyo-sil reporter said, "I suddenly became the culprit who framed the innocent Jung Joon-young." ”

Zheng Junying's fans commented: "Thinking of Zheng Junying crying, my heart is about to break, and I must be very aggrieved." ”

In January 2017, Jung Jun-young officially returned to the Korean national variety show "Two Days and One Night" and re-active in his acting career. And the chat records on his mobile phone in 2015 and 2016, including the "KakaoTalk Dialogue Group" that later shocked the Korean entertainment industry, have actually been backed up and then transferred to another reporter, Kang Kyung-yoon.

It was also this backup that caused a huge shock in Korean entertainment.

Reporter Kang Kyung-yoon

Reporter Jiang Jingyun said that at the beginning, she didn't realize the seriousness of the matter at all, and she thought that the most she could do was to verify the illegal candid photography evidence controlled by Jingmei. But she found that Jung Joon-young secretly took videos of dozens of women and uploaded them to multiple chat groups, and then the members of the group would comment on the women who were secretly photographed, and the words were extremely insulting.

In this chat group, popular male stars such as Lee Seung-seung, Choi Jong-hoon, Lee Jong-hyun (former member of CNBlue), Yong Hyung-joon (former member of Highlight), singers Eddy Kim and Roy Kim are prominently listed.

In the power relations within the group, Choi Jong-hoon, as the captain of FTIsland, is just an obedient and obedient little brother, and the real "big brother" is the former member of Bigbang who was at the peak of his popularity at that time - Lee Shengli, who claimed to be "Shengzby". During the period of the crazy second-generation Korean entertainment group, the huge popularity and commercial success can give a mediocre-looking Korean man who sings and dances to a mediocre Korean man, and this story may only be told by him - a great Korean Gatsby.

At that time, he was busy expanding his business empire while actively marketing the image of the Bigbang team as a "group bully" in front of his fans. In order to connect with wealthy businessmen and dignitaries in East and Southeast Asia, Li Shengli actively provided sexual entertainment services for his VIP guests, "Shengli used women as a tool to obtain investment from the rich." At this time, his role changed from a "group bully" to an ambitious "pimp".

Li Shengli

In addition, Kang Kyung-yoon also discovered that in January 2016, Jung Joon-young, Choi Jong-hoon, and three other people left behind image and video evidence when they gang-raped an unconscious female friend during a resort trip. At that time, like a joke, they uploaded multiple sets of videos to the chat group and shared them with Li Shengli, who was not present.

Similar misdeeds continue to occur. The day before Jung Joon-young's fan signing session in Daegu, in the presence of others, he and Choi Jong-hoon gang-raped another unconscious woman, and when asked by friends, Choi Jong-hoon boasted in the chat group, "It can be said that it was the most wonderful night of my life." ”

The chat group left this message: "I was really frightened yesterday, thinking that the woman was really going to have a concussion, and the sound of her skull hitting the ground when she fell, Junying and I were shocked." "This woman is so drunk that her head is going to be shattered."

Kang Kyung-yoon, a reporter who witnessed the information, said: "They treat women as toys, make them unconscious, insult them, maliciously judge them, and show off as trophies, sneering." ”

Some of the chats published in the documentary

In addition to the group used to share sexual violence with friends, Jung Joon-young also has another group that contains information about alleged collusion with the police, and Choi Jong-hoon, who attempted to run away with a drunk driver, shared with friends that he received a call from the police officer in charge of his case to wish him a happy birthday.

02 Fortress of Arrogance

The documentary also revealed for the first time a video of Li Shengli forcibly dragging and physically intimidating a young woman at a party, which is extremely vicious, and it is easy to recall that he once demanded that Blackpink, who had just debuted at the time, attend an event in front of the camera, and after being refused, he blackfaced and sarcastically mocked the newcomer.

A video of Li Shengli dragging a woman at a party in the documentary

"Lee believes in the influence he has [as a member of Bigbang] as long as he says a word...... At least it can mobilize the connections of Seoul's Gangnam nightclub circle. Soon, the reporter found clues that the small group had no fear and believed that they could be above the law.

Li Shengli's nightclub business was booming, and in addition to his popularity at that time, the protective forces from the police also played a very important role in it - "Chief of Police", as they called this mysterious figure in the group.

On February 23, 2018, Burning Sun, known as the largest nightclub in Gangnam-gu, was grandly opened.

People who have worked at Burning Sun said in an interview that their job is to be in charge of having girls in the nightclub to entertain VIP guests. Reservations are required for booths in the store, and the most common ones cost about 10,000 yuan, soaring to 60,000 yuan on weekends, and hundreds of thousands of dollars on special holidays such as Christmas. When an important guest arrives, dozens of girls carry lit fireworks bouquets to celebrate him.

事情曝光后的Burning Sun

Drugs abuse, rape, prostitution, sexual assault, clandestine photography, bribery and other shady crimes mostly occur in private spaces created for VIPs. A former staff member said that there was a room in the depths of the nightclub with many security guards outside, and no one could hear what was going on inside, and that he would see a girl lose consciousness after taking rape drugs in Burning Sun almost every day.

In the documentary, the oral accounts of real victims

In order to attract male customers, nightclub salespeople will secretly take pictures of beautiful women or drunk women without their permission, and send the photos to male VIP customers. Rape drugs are used in large quantities in Burning Sun, because once there are women designated by VIP customers, the salesmen will try their best to bring them to the customers and leave the unconscious girls at their disposal.

A young woman who was raped by a stranger at Burning Sun summoned the courage to tell her nightmarish experience when she woke up in a strange hotel bed where they used severe violence against her and kept pushing her down. "No matter how hard she struggles, it's useless," she said, so she gave up struggling, slid out of bed and knelt on the floor, crying and begging for mercy, to which she was replied: "I'll let you go, but you can't go until you've finished taking pictures." ”

"He asked me to smile and take pictures, but I couldn't laugh at all, I tried to cover my face, but he wouldn't let me," recalls the woman crying many times. She later escaped from the police, but the other party used the photos she was forced to take as a threat, easily escaped, and left South Korea smoothly.

"Things that ordinary people can't imagine are happening in reality, but no one knows about them, and the private rooms in the depths of the nightclub have gradually become a dark castle for Li Shengli's VIPs," commented Gao Eunsang, a reporter who was the first to investigate the Burning Sun incident.

Tear a hole open, and the media's searchlight has a chance to shine in. Until November 24, 2018, 28-year-old Kim Sang-kyo, an enthusiastic citizen who went to Burning Sun to celebrate a friend's birthday, was beaten by nightclub executives and security guards while protecting a woman who was forcibly dragged away by employees.

Burning Sun为VIP们打造的私密空间

When the police arrived, they arrested only one person, Kim Sang-kyo, who was beaten again by the police at the police station and convicted of violence, assault and sexual assault. In December, Kim Sang-kyo began to post a large number of stories on the Internet about his experience, and was countersued by the police for reputational damage, and then the South Korean media began to investigate and follow up, and a series of vicious incidents were exposed, and within 3 months, Burning Sun was shut down and Li Shengli withdrew from the circle.

Because the incident led to police cover-up and sexual bribery, then South Korean Prime Minister Lee Luoyuan once publicly stated that he asked the police to investigate strictly and thoroughly, and respond to the people's doubts about the police with fair investigation results.

But in the end, finding out the identity of the high-level police officer known as the "chief of police" did not count on the self-examination of the Korean police, and it was the actress Gu Hara who took the initiative to contact the reporter Kang Kyung-yoon at a critical time, saying that she wanted to help.

03 The brave Goo Hara

For Chinese audiences, Goo Hara's most well-known screen role should be the youngest daughter of the president's family in the hit drama "City Hunter" starring Lee Min Ho. And her more well-known identity is actually a member of the popular girl group KARA.

On November 23, 2019, she posted a photo of herself in bed on ins, with the text Good Night, and the next day, when she was found by the police, she had committed suicide at the age of 28. And her ex-boyfriend Choi Jong-beom, who threatened and intimidated her with intimate videos and violently beat her to cause uterine bleeding, was not convicted of assault and intimidation until October 2020 and sentenced to one year in prison.

According to the lawyer who represented Goo Hara in the criminal case against Choi Jong-beom, Choi Jong-beom sent Goo Hara a sex video recorded on his mobile phone at the time, blackmailed her, and threatened to make it public, so that her acting career was completely ruined.

It has always been Goo Hara's dream to become a singer, and she feels a great fear of losing everything she has worked so hard to earn. , a girl idol who has always maintained the image of a cute ghost horse in front of the camera and shines on the stage, knelt on the ground in the surveillance camera of the apartment elevator and humbly begged for mercy from her ex-boyfriend.

The video allegedly shows Goo Hara kneeling in front of Choi Jong-bum in front of the elevator

At that time, the lawyer considered that the backlash of public opinion was not conducive to the maintenance of her image and suggested that she reconcile. But in the end, Goo Hara did not listen to the advice of the lawyer, but chose to call the police, and generously appeared at the police station to cooperate with the investigation. When she took the initiative to contact reporter Kang Kyung-yoon and asked for help, she said that she was also a victim of a pornographic revenge candid film, referring to this exhausting experience.

Born in Gwangju, South Korea, Goo Ha-ra has been a good friend with Choi Jong-hoon since he was a trainee, and he has also known Lee Shengli and Jung Jun-young. She told Kang Kyung-yoon that she had seen her friends' mobile phone screens, "There are really a lot of abnormal things in their mobile phones."

"Who the hell is the Chief of Police?" Goo Ha-ra asked his friend Choi Jong-hoon this question on behalf of the reporter and persuaded him to tell Kang Kyung-yoon all the information he knew.

In a phone call with Choi Jong-hoon, the true identity of the "chief of police" was identified as a senior superintendent named Yoon Kyu-geun, who had worked at the Blue House and had been instructing his many police officers to facilitate the illegal activities of Lee and his friends for many years and to accept bribes.

Choi Jong-hoon and the "Chief of Police"

The puzzle in the hands of reporters was finally complete, and then, a blockbuster report was released. Lee Shengli, Jung Jun-young, Choi Jong-hoon and others were immediately arrested, and Yoon Kyu-geun was suspended.

It is not mentioned in the documentary that the person who saw an illegal candid video on his friend's mobile phone was actually not the only one who saw a video taken by Gu Hara. Although former boy group member Long Hyung-chun was not directly involved in the above-mentioned crimes, he was one of the onlookers in Zheng Junying's chat group.

However, in contrast to the slut-humiliated and unprovoked attacks that Goo Hara suffered during her lifetime, to this day, there are still die-hard fans of Yong Hyung-joon, who are keen to maintain his innocent image of "definitely not saying anything to his friends' misdeeds" in various comment sections on the grounds that he is "just in the group".

04 Unfinished justice

Lawyer Fang, who participated in the provision of legal aid, pointed out that compared with other types of sexual assault cases, the victims who were illegally photographed did not know that they were victims, which was the most significant feature of the cases. Some women who have crossed paths with this small gang will get into a state of deep anxiety and reach out to their lawyers, and the most common question they receive is, "Maybe I'm in the video?" ”

After the incident was exposed, the woman who was gang-raped by Jung Joon-young and Choi Jong-hoon in Daegu took the initiative to contact reporters and lawyers, and after confirming the fact that she had been violated, filed an accusation. In the end, a total of 6 female victims filed a complaint in this incident, and their biggest concern was: "Has the video gone out?" ”

However, neither lawyers nor journalists can answer this question, which causes infinite pain and stress to victims.

During a street protest by women in South Korea on March 8, 2019, the public demanded that the government take steps to destroy illegally filmed pornography and make changes. At the scene, one protester said: "For women, no matter where we are, it feels like being in the Burning Sun. ”

Women protest in the streets of South Korea on March 8, 2019

On the other hand, Lee's ex-partner claimed that he had been attacked by Korean feminists, and he issued a "complaint" and rhetorical question: "If the content of Shengsheng's KakaoTalk chat three years ago was considered a crime, wouldn't all Korean men become criminals?" ”

These two opposing accusations perfectly convey the essence of the problem of sexual violence and exploitation in South Korea, that is, it is not just a problem of Hallyu celebrities who are powerful, unconscionable, and do not know what it means to respect women, but the general characteristics of a patriarchal society that instrumentalizes, objectifies, and sexualizes women as much as possible.

Sexual exploitation is not just a private matter, on the contrary, it is a social error and social harm that occurs at the individual level.

It must be emphasized that the two female reporters who participated in the investigation were seriously harassed and threatened after the report was issued, and Park Hyo-sil, a reporter who was the first to report on Jung Joon-young's secretly photographing his girlfriend, was harassed by Jung Joon-young's fans of cyberviolence, had a mental breakdown, had two miscarriages, and has been depressed to this day.

Park Hyo-sil had a nervous breakdown after being harassed by Jung Joon-young's fans and had two miscarriages, and is still depressed

Kang Kyung-yoon's reporter took over the baton from fellow reporter Park Hyo-sil and ran for the truth during her pregnancy, enduring great pressure and trauma, but after the report was released, she was also severely harassed and physically attacked by her fan base for three years. "Feminist" or "pregnant feminist", that's how fans scolded her.

Gu Hara, who has been struggling all her life, chose to give up and ended her life a month after her friend Shirley committed suicide. If it weren't for this documentary, the public wouldn't have known that in the midst of the chaos that left her anxious, Goo Hara was still tragically practicing justice and offering sincere support to women – as the jurist Nussbaum said in "The Fortress of Arrogance": You don't have to stand there alone, you stand with all of us, we support each other and demand justice.

Goo Hara and her friend Shirley

On the other hand, Li Shengli, who prides himself on "winning Tspby", is still living a swaggering and luxurious life after being released from prison in February 2023, traveling frequently to and from Southeast Asia. At a private party in Cambodia, he didn't forget to walk his former teammate Quan Zhilong, who was miserable by him, and said: "I will bring him here one day!" ”

Jung Joon-young and Choi Jong-hoon, who have repeatedly gang-raped unconscious women and filmed videos for fun, have also been released from prison in March this year and November 2021 respectively and regained their freedom.

Ideally, in the area of sexual exploitation, recourse to impartial laws would have a good effect, preventing the recurrence of a large number of practices that had existed and educating society about the importance of women's dignity. The severity of the punishment faced by Li Shengli is more like a slap in the face of gender justice under the current law.

Far from being a deterrent to the fear of offenders, and the fact that such felonies and penalties are too low for the law to reshape the behaviour of sexual exploiters more deeply, what can people do in such a situation?

A flawed solution, and the punishment strategy that South Korean society prefers, is to make the moral humiliation and public delisting of the people who are the consensus of Korean entertainment when the law and its safeguards fail to meet people's needs for justice.

The public must also be involved, and as consumers of non-essential goods, fans have a considerable influence on the success of entertainment media. When morality and law become obstacles to the pursuit of profit, the link between arrogance and greed is broken. This means that even if they refuse to admit their mistake, consumers should make them pay.

As we've seen, the events that brought down the K-Pop superstars weren't just caused by reputable whistleblowers. Ordinary women, celebrities, zealous citizens, and civil rights attorneys have been making their voices heard. Their efforts have made tremendous progress in shaping a new legal culture and public opinion. At least now, women's accusations can be taken more seriously, even if they don't always win their cases and don't always win by a big margin.

Documentary "The Burning Sun: Revealing the Secrets of Hallyu Celebrity Chat Rooms"

At the very least, these voices have begun to create a culture of self-confidence: if these brave people stop being afraid to stand up and trust each other, then everyone may be willing to speak the truth.

-END-

Editor-in-Chief on Duty | Zhao Jinghan

Typography | promise

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