Toronto Sun - Canada October 19, 2010
Gang rape allegations orchestrated by church leader, lawyer says
By TAMARA CHERRY, TORONTO SUN
One of the so-called victims of alleged gang rapes within a Korean "cult" now says the allegations were fictitiously scripted by the "cult leader," a lawyer for one of the accused charged said Tuesday.
The case unravelled in March after a teenaged girl and three young women told police they were drugged, beaten and gang-raped by a group of men whom they had met through a Korean church between the fall of 2009 and February 2010.
Three men were arrested before a fifth complainant came forward, prompting the arrests of two sisters who are, according to defence lawyer Jacqueline An, the nieces of Pastor Jae-Gap Song, who leads the so-called church.
A sixth complainant came forward in May, An said.
Since their arrests, An has maintained that the story was orchestrated by Song, who she says controlled roughly 50 people, many of them here on visas from Korea, kept them behind locked apartment doors and made them craft and wear matching uniforms.
Orangeville Police records show Song was arrested on March 14 on one count of sexual assault, which stems from an alleged attack exactly one month earlier.
An alleges it was that attack that Song was trying to mask by forcing a group of his followers to go to police with bogus rape stories.
One of those victims went to An three weeks ago with a 50-plus-pages "script" that outlines what the women were made to tell police, An alleged.
The woman, in her mid-20s, said Song wrote and made the women memorize the script, which outlined the alleged drugging and gang rapes, An alleged.
Police could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
"Song is one scary animal. He's a Korean version of some sick sexual cult leader," An charged, adding the woman "escaped" from one of the apartments after lying about where she was going.
An said she asked the woman whether the allegations were true, to which "She said, 'No, it's all fabricated.'
"She brought pictures of the place that she was held in custody, all the locks inside the house, not outside ‹ she couldn't leave. She brought a picture of an alarm that when you leave the house, it will ring, to keep track of her. She was never alone. She had to plan like two months for this escape."
An called on police to look into the new evidence, which she said was brought to them by the woman.
"This is a complete fabrication," she said. "Why are the police not doing anything? She said she escaped custody, he would (allegedly abuse) her, he (allegedly) threatened her to make up these crazy allegations against these poor innocent people."
A preliminary hearing for three men and two women is set for next summer. Three more men are wanted on warrants after An alleges they were "sent back home (to Korea) by Song."
This article was found at:
http://www.torontosun.com/news/torontoandgta/2010/10/19/15751916.html
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Global News - Canada March 22, 2010
Alleged gang rapists free on bail
Darryl Konynenbelt, Global News
Three alleged gang rapists are now free on bail, but not soon enough according to their lawyer.
Toronto's Hyung Jun Ha, 26, and Sang Cheol Lee, 37, as well as Jong Il Lee, 33, of Orangeville, have been charged with various counts of gang sexual assault, forcible confinement, threatening death, administering a drug for sex, assault and making child pornography. One of the four female victims is a minor.
Police say the suspects got to know the victims through a Korean community church in North Toronto.
Outside the courtroom, Global News discovered a group of church members siding with the accused.
"There is a call for a healthy dose of skepticism," said Ian Shoub, a lawyer who spoke for the church members.
"Many doubt these charges", he said.
Journalist Jay Jung, a reporter for Korea Times Daily, began investigating the church after members, including the suspects, recently broke away from the congregation.
"They felt Pastor Song had done something wrong and it was not right," Jung said.
Jung is referring to Pastor Jae-Gap Song, a man ex-church members say tried to wield too much control over a congregation of 50 women and 10 men.
Global News has also learned church members at one time all lived together in an apartment in West Toronto.
"I will call him a fanatical leader," said Shoub. "This is what this case is all about."
Global News tracked down Pastor Song to what is reportedly his home in West Toronto. He did not responded to the accusations by ex-congregation members.
A Canada-wide warrant has also been issued for three other men in the case: Jin Hyun Kim, 33, Yoon Hyun Cho, 26, and Jung Jay Lee, 26, all of Toronto.
Police say the gang sexual assaults occurred between the fall of 2009 and last month.
This article was found at:
http://www.globaltoronto.com/Alleged+gang+rapists+free+bail/2703785/story.html
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Posts
Sects, money and tragedy have history in Korea
ReplyDelete‘Believers are robbed of decision-making abilities. That’s why violence is possible and dangerous.
BY SEO JI-EUN, Korea JoongAng Daily May 26,2014
The sinking of the Sewol ferry and the hunt for the shadowy pastor-businessman behind the company that owned and operated it has gripped the nation.
For Lim Young-sook, a 57-year-old housewife in Seoul, it has brought back extremely bad memories of her own family’s tragic brush with Yoo Byung-eun 17 years ago.
Lim’s late mother lived alone in the 1990s in a spacious apartment in Seoul’s Gwanak District. She was known in the neighborhood for being affluent.
A group of strangers befriended her and started dropping by to chat and give her massages. The chats became more frequent, until the point they convinced the old woman she could be saved if she simply joined their religious group: the Evangelical Baptist Church, better known as Guwonpa, or the Salvation Sect, founded by Yoo and his father-in-law.
One day in 1997, the mother declared to her family that salvation had indeed come to her while listening to a tape of one of Yoo’s sermons.
“Guwonpa believers make a record of the exact time at which they got saved, the moment they felt this enormous wave of emotion,” Lim said. “My mom was not an exception.”
But salvation came at a price. Lim’s mother had been buying from her sect friends large amounts of squalene, a type of dietary supplement made from shark livers, which cost 1.3 million won ($1,270) per box. She bought many costly and shoddy items at inflated prices, some of which remain in her house. Lim thinks her mother spent hundreds of millions of won on them.
Then the mother was offered the opportunity to invest in a “heaven-like silver town with top-notch medical staff and facilities” the church was building. She forked over 560 million won, a big portion of her assets, without telling her sons and daughters.
Before long, Yoo’s Semo Group filed for bankruptcy with more than 300 billion won in debt. The 560 million won promissory given to Lim’s mother was worthless. Devastated by the loss and betrayal, the mother was never the same and eventually passed away in 2008 following a lengthy stay in a hospital.
“The Salvation Sect obviously took aim at my mother, who was old and lonely but with a lot of money,” Lim said. “They also rope in people who aren’t rich. But they have to work for free to the church.”
There’s nothing wrong with people offering their labor to a church they believe in. The problem with Yoo, according to Tark Ji-il, a professor of religious history at the Busan Presbyterian University, is that the entrepreneur-pastor built up his businesses through his power as a religious leader - and on the assets or labor of his believers - and then used those businesses to become personally rich.
“Yoo may have started out as a charismatic religious leader but after 40 years he has been blinded by selfish interests and desires,” Tark says. “Yoo preached that corporate activities are equivalent to religious activities … He used his followers as a tool to bloat his wealth.”
Chung Dong-seop, a Christian pastor who was once a part of the Salvation Sect, said in a radio show on April 24 that Yoo, 74, “expanded his business through a sweating system of its believers and exploitation of their labor.”
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At the same time, he also ran his businesses unsafely. A series of former Salvation Sect followers have gone public since the Sewol sinking saying they volunteered to help build ferries operated by Semo Group on the Han River starting in 1986. Semo became the subject to an investigation after three of its ferries collided with Mapo Bridge during a flood and capsized in 1990, killing 13 passengers and losing one who is still considered missing. The company was formally cleared of any liability.
ReplyDelete“Working hard at companies run by Yoo’s church was identical to salvation and an act of worship,” the former follower-pastor Chung said. The Korea Broadcasting System on April 23 ran an interview with a former employee of Chonghaejin Marine, operator of the Sewol, who said more than 90 percent of the company’s workers are followers of Yoo, although the church officially denied it.
A joint investigation team of police and prosecutors has gotten testimony from executives of Chonghaejin Marine, saying that being a Guwonpa believer was a prerequisite for a promotion to higher positions at the company.
Salvation for self-abnegation
Korea has a tradition of religious sects that exploit believers and evolve into big businesses that enrich their leaders and their families - and often lead to death, suicide or fatal accidents like the Sewol’s sinking.
Smaller cults have flourished offering salvation for some form of self-abnegation before collapsing in crime or waves of their followers’ blood.
In 1982, a woman named Kim Gi-sun founded a Christian-rooted cult, deifying herself. The Trinity, according to her, consists of singing, dancing and laughter and she proclaimed she was clean and sinless because she was aga, a baby in Korean.
Attracting hundreds of believers, she ran a large-scale farm called Aga Hill on 106 acres in Incheon, Gyeonggi. She also ran the biggest record store in Seoul called Shinnara. Believers worked for no pay and surrendered their own property or wealth to the cult.
The cult collapsed in 1996 after dozens of believers reported that Kim ordered the murder of defecting devotees and secretly buried their bodies. A court, however, acquitted her of murder, citing a lack of evidence. Kim, now in her 70s, was instead sentenced to a four-year prison term for tax evasion and embezzlement and was released on bail later.
A Christian doomsday cult in the 1980s called Yeongsaenggyo, literally “eternal life,” ended badly after founder and leader Cho Hee-seong was charged with extorting money and labor from his believers and ordering some to kidnap and murder nine people who were trying to flee the religion or who slandered Cho. He was declared not guilty of murder due to a lack of evidence but was sentenced to two years in prison for harboring convicts. He died of a heart attack in prison in 2004.
The Salvation Sect at the center of the Sewol tragedy traces its origins to the Evangelical Baptist Church, founded in 1962 by Yoo and his father-in-law Kwon Shin-chan. Kwon claimed he was “saved” on Nov. 18, 1961. The church later split into three sects run by different leaders. The two other sects have churches across Seoul and Daejeon that have no connection with Yoo’s Salvation Sect.
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The Salvation Sect is known to teach believers they will earn the right to heaven irrespective of their sins - but only after they are formally “saved.” The Presbyterian Church of Korea officially characterized Yoo’s Evangelical Baptist Church as heretics in 1992 for violating mainstream Christian beliefs.
ReplyDeleteYoo transformed himself into an entrepreneur in the early 1970s by acquiring a trading firm, becoming chairman of the Semo Group in 1979. Despite Semo’s eventual collapse, Yoo rose from a mountain of debt to become a multi-billionaire in less than two decades. The accumulated value of the assets owned by Yoo and his two sons and two daughters is estimated at over 240 billion won.
Prosecutors describe a pyramid-like structure of dozens of subsidiaries under the holding company I-One-I Holdings. They say Yoo has no stake in any of the subsidiaries but is the de facto mastermind of all the operations. The basis of all the business was the bank accounts or other assets of the sect’s believers.
Scandal touched the sect in 1987 when the bound and gagged bodies of 32 people were found stacked in two piles in a factory in Yongin, Gyeonggi. All of the dead were either workers at a handicraft manufacturer called Odaeyang or members of their families. Twenty-seven years later, it is still a mystery whether the people committed suicide or were murdered.
The owner of the factory, Park Sun-ja, was a defector from the Salvation Sect who set up her own cult, which she also named Odaeyang.
Park and Yoo were found to have made hundreds of millions of monetary transactions with each other, which led prosecutors to suspect Yoo was connected to the deaths. But no direct link was ever found.
In August 1991, Yoo was sentenced to four years in jail for “habitual fraud under the mask of religion.” The court said he embezzled almost 120 million won in funds collected by Guwonpa believers for the sect.
Business cults unique to Korea
According to Professor Tark, the phenomenon of “new religions pursuing profit through corporate activities” is unique to Korea. That conclusion is based on his comparison of the classification of new religious movements in the United States and Europe over the past 120 years and a similar study of modern Korea by Lee Kang-oh, head of the private Korean New Religion Research Center.
Tark is one of three sons, all religion experts, of Tark Myung-hwan, a renowned religious researcher who spearheaded a move to combat crazy cults. He was murdered by a religious zealot in 1994. The scope of his research included the Salvation Sect.
As Korea went through rapid social changes over a relatively short period - from colonialism to war, dictatorship and democracy - traditional religions had trouble keeping up with the chaos and insecurity, and the door was opened to ambitious shysters, according to Lee. They thrived by criticizing existing religions and offering salvation in a quicker or more direct way.
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Personally they became wealthy because of all the opportunities available in rapidly developing Korea, especially in the real estate market.
ReplyDeleteLee, the research center head and an honorary professor of philosophy at Chonbuk National University, noted in his epic 1992 “Korea’s New Religion Almanac” that 200 of the 390 new religious bodies that came into existence between the 1960s and 1990s were born in the 1980s. He interpreted that as a sign that South Korea’s dictatorship stirred both political tensions and confusions that led to the weakening of traditional religions.
The messages of the new religions varied according to the spirit of the times, Tark says. “The emerging religions under the [Park Chung Hee] regime in the 1970s stood for anti-Communist,” he said. The theme shifted to salvation through wealth later.
“Money can guarantee the stability of religious activities and vise versa,” he says.
These days, members of the Salvation Sect deny that Yoo is their patriarch. But when prosecutors tried searching the sect’s 115-acre compound known as Geumsuwon in Anseong on the outskirts of Seoul, thousands of believers staged a rally for days at the gates, acting as human shields for Yoo. Some proclaimed they were willing to be martyred to protect Yoo.
Such kind of devotion is hard for ordinary people to understand. The experts say the adherents have devoted everything to the sect, from their personal lives and family ties to their private properties.
“The moment Yoo is caught and his empire collapses, the followers’ lives will be over,” says the housewife Lim Young-sook. “Many of them have nowhere else to live or any means to feed themselves. They have no choice but to believe.”
Tark says “depriving believers of everything” is one of many techniques used by cult leaders to maintain their obedience. Devotees have to be robbed of their personal decision-making abilities.
“You shouldn’t try to approach new religion issues with logic or common sense,” he says. “Cult leaders tend to take control of their followers by depriving them of everything. Believers are robbed of their decision-making ability by manipulative mind control. That’s why violence or any kind of far-from-common-sense action is possible and very dangerous.”
Tark warns that patriarch Yoo, who is still at large, has been able to maintain close ties with powerful figures in the corporate, political, government and media communities, and also the prosecution.
A “Yoo Byung-eun list,” which names people who have been photographed with the suspect, has been circulating.
“There are a lot of beneficiaries of what we may describe as ‘Yoo Byung-eun’ largesse out there and his wide human network is his insurance policy,” Tark says.
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2989684&cloc=joongangdaily%7Chome%7Ctop
The Cults of South Korea
ReplyDeleteThe recent ferry tragedy has added another chapter to the country’s disconcerting history with cults.
By John Power, the Diplomat June 17, 2014
For more than six weeks, an obscure Christian sect widely described as a cult has dominated the news in South Korea. The reason: its alleged connection to aferry sinking in April that killed more than 300 people.
Yoo Byung-eun, the founder of the Salvation Sect and alleged de facto owner of the ferry’s operating firm, has become the country’s most wanted man, with the authorities offering a $500,000 reward for information leading to his arrest. He and his family stand accused of corruption, poor management and illegal modifications to the ferry Sewol that prosecutors say contributed to its sinking with hundreds of high school students onboard. Despite a massive manhunt across the country, Yoo has continued to elude capture since a court issued a warrant for his arrest on May 22.
“They (the Salvation Sect) began around the early 1970s. Their doctrine is influenced by the foreign missionaries,” Tark Ji-il, a professor at Busan Presbyterian University and expert on cults in Korea, told The Diplomat. “According to them, they don’t need to repent again and again. We need only one repentance. Right after realization of sin, there is no need to repent again. Because, according to them, righteous man is righteous man, even if they have committed a sin.”
While Yoo is regarded simply as a church leader by some members, more devoted followers see him as a messianic figure, according to Tark.
But while the Salvation Sect is currently the focus of national scrutiny, it is just one of many shadowy religious groups operating in South Korea, a country with one of Asia’s largest communities of Christians, divided among an incalculable number of churches. While it is difficult to determine an exact figure, perhaps hundreds of cults exist in Korea, according to Tark. Even without concrete figures, he believes that South Korea is unique among Asian and developing countries for the prevalence of such groups. In his book The Koreans: Who They Are, What They Want, Where Their Future Lies, journalist Michael Breen reported that one church minister in the early 1960s identified some 70 Koreans who claimed to be the messiah and had followers.
The definition of a cult is not uncontroversial, in Korea and elsewhere, with followers typically rejecting the pejorative term. Timothy Lee, an expert in Evangelicalism in Korea at Brite Divinity School in Texas, said that contemporary historians typically avoid “value judgments on religious phenomena.” He did, however, offer several possible criteria for making the determination.
“I would say when seeking to determine whether a religious group is a cult or a legitimate church, one has to, among others, consider these three criteria: the freedom with which one can affiliate and disaffiliate with the group, the transparency in its leadership structure, and the group’s attitude toward larger society, with a cult assuming a much more exclusivist and condemnatory attitude toward society.”
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Certainly Korean fringe churches to have attracted the label have been implicated in fraud, brainwashing, coercion, and other behavior associated with cults worldwide. The most sinister have been linked to criminality as serious as systematic rape and even murder.
ReplyDeleteIn 1987, 33 members of the cult Odaeyang, of which the current fugitive Yoo was once a member, were found dead in a factory in Yongin, about 50 km south of Seoul. It has never been conclusively determined whether the cult members, whose bodies were found bound and gagged, had been murdered or committed mass suicide. Followers of the group’s leader Park Soon-ja, who was also among the dead, had believed that the world, irretrievably mired in decadence, was coming to an end.
Busan Presbyterian University professor Tark’s own father was murdered by a member of another cult in 1994.
In 2009, the leader of a South Korean cult known as Providence or Jesus Morning Star, among other names, was convicted of the rape or sexual assault of four of his female followers.
In April of this year, a television documentary for Australian broadcaster SBS detailed how the church was continuing to groom women in the country as future “brides” for its head Jeong Myeong-Seok, who is reported to have told his followers that their sins could be cleansed by having sex with him. Two Australian former members of the cult claimed they had been encouraged to write sexually explicit letters to Jeong and were even taken to Seoul to visit him in prison.
Providence/JMS is also one of several groups based in Korea to have a notable presence abroad. Perhaps no controversial Korean church has had more impact outside of Korea than the Unification Church, commonly referred to as the “Moonies,” which saw modest recruitment in the U.S. during the 1970s. It has faced accusations of brainwashing its members, a claim denied by the church as well as some independent religious scholars.
What most of Korea’s controversial religious groups have in common is that they can be traced back to one of three periods in the country’s modern history, according to Tark: the Japanese occupation, the Korean War, and the period of military dictatorships that reached the peak of its authoritarianism in the 1970s and 1980s.
In the case of the former two periods, Tark said, instability and hardship helped popularize religious organizations that offered solace and valorized suffering.
“Right after 1931, it looked very hard to be saved from the Japanese occupation so they focused on Jesus Christ, who suffered on the cross. So it is a kind of mysticism,” he said.
During the dictatorship period, meanwhile, many cult leaders could gain a foothold by supporting the government, unlike a lot of the anti-dictatorship mainline Protestant churches, according to Tark.
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Various opinions exist as to the appeal of Korea’s fringe religious groups.
ReplyDeletePeter Daley, a longtime resident who has researched cults in Korea since 2003 when his roommate became a member of Providence/JSM, said that one reason may be the relative lack of ambiguity in their teachings.
“With these groups, there’re no shades of grey, everything is absolutely, ‘yes, this guy is the messiah, yes, if you follow him you’ll go to heaven,’” said Daley, who claimed that his website jmscult.com and work with media has seen him threatened by disgruntled followers. “Some people feel that the … more mainstream groups sometimes don’t make these grandiose claims. So when a group comes along with all the answers to ‘a,’ ‘b,’ and ‘c,’ that can be appealing to some people.”
Peer pressure and the deference toward one’s elders present in Korea society also work to the advantage of cult leaders, he said.
“Then you get these older Korean guys dressed up in suits; it can be hard for a younger Korean person to question that, especially when a new member is thrust into an environment where there are a lot of current members.”
Many groups are also highly Korea-centric, basing their beliefs around the idea that the country and Koreans themselves are somehow favored by God or otherwise special.
“Because they believe the new messiah is a Korean, the new revelation is written in Korean, the new nation (of people) who are going to be saved – 144,000 people – are Koreans, or the kingdom of God will be established in Korea (they can have many loyal Korea followers),” said Tark.
A cultural aspect of another sort may also be at play, according to Lee, the Brite Divinity School professor.
“I am not sure whether the number of cult-like organizations in Korea is, proportionally speaking, larger than in, say, Japan or the United States. But compared to Westerners, Koreans tend to be less individualistic and more communal, disposing them to affiliate with some organizations, which will typically assume some familial shape,” he said.
“And if leaders of such organizations develop a sense of religious calling that is looked askance by the larger society, gather followers around them, and insist on their practicing exclusivism, you have the beginnings of cults.”
Update: A PR rep for Ahae Press, Inc., which “markets and exhibits the work of the photographer AHAE (Mr. Yoo Byung-eun),” has contacted The Diplomat to deny a number of the assertions made about Yoo in this article, specifically his links to the Sewol and the Odaeyang cult. The Diplomat stands by its reporting. Yoo remains wanted by Korean police.
http://thediplomat.com/2014/06/the-cults-of-south-korea/
How a South Korean Cult Tried and Failed to Sue This Australian Uni Lecturer
ReplyDeleteBy John Power, Vice April 19, 2016
South Korea has more than its fair share of shadowy religious cults, but Jesus Morning Star (JSM), ranks among its more notorious. The sect claims to be a benign religious group that follows the Bible. But former members have described the leader, JeongMyeong-seok, as a self-proclaimed messiah who used claims of divine authority to groom young women. Tellingly, Jeong is currently serving a 10-year prison sentence for the rape and sexual assault of five women across several Asian countries.
Canberra native Peter Daley is a lecturer in South Korea and he's spent the past 13 years tracking the movements of JMS and several other sects at his website jmscult.com. In 2014, Peter was interviewed by SBS' The Feed in a report on how JMS targets university women in Australia to become Jeong's "spiritual brides."
Unsurprisingly, Peter's unconventional hobby hasn't endeared him to cult members. Recently, several female members tried to have him prosecuted for defamation, which is a criminal offence in South Korea. Peter had posted video footage of them nakedly praising Jeong on his website, even though the footage was heavily pixelated and already available in the public domain. After a seven-month investigation by police and prosecutors, Peter was cleared of all charges last month.
We asked Peter about his legal travails, how he became the foremost Western expert on Korean cults, and what JMS is up to in Australia.
VICE: Hi Peter, how did you first get into tracking South Korean cults?
Peter Daley: I moved to Korea in 2003 and took a job teaching English in a rural town in the mountains. A few months later I discovered it was the closest town to the base of this cult known as JMS. My roommate was a member but when she decided to leave, the group threatened her. They told her God would kill someone in her family and members started following her around town. They were waiting for her at the swimming pool she would swim at twice a week.
There wasn't much information in English at the time and I became quite fascinated by the organisation—how it operated, how it indoctrinated people. As there wasn't much information in English I started a site. As that was in 2003 it's been growing since then.
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Tell us more about this cult.
ReplyDeleteThe videos, I think, provide a really clear window into how they indoctrinate young women, if they're beautiful enough. The videos show naked university students together—there are about four or five of them in one video—naked and dancing around saying "Seonsaengnim, we love you!" Seonsaengnim is the word for teacher.
There's another video showing a woman licking a photo of the leader and then she holds it up to her vagina. So this is a clear indication that sex has a pretty key role in the deeper levels of the cult.
What can you tell us about JMS in Australia?
It's pretty small, but they do have presences in the major cities. The SBS report interviewed two girls who were recruited around the Australian National University campus. At the moment, their main branch is in Melbourne and there has been recruitment at the University of Melbourne. Their goal is to pretty much target tall attractive women, and they rationalise this by telling their members that outward appearance is a sign of inward beauty and a sign that God has chosen them to become part of this.
Yes, that's creepy. So how did you come to be sued by the cult?
I think the cult saw me as more of a threat following the SBS report. Between 2014 and last August, I'd get these intermediate threats. Then in August 2015, I got a call from police telling me I was being sued by several members. I was given a document to sign from JMS saying they'd drop the charges if I apologised, closed my website, and never spoke about them again. I just refused immediately. I didn't even have to think about it really, it was just an automatic no.
Were you scared to turn them down?
I wouldn't say I was scared, but it weighed heavily on me. Members have committed violence against reporters and critics in the past, so that is always a possibility. I was certainly nervous going to the first police interview, but once it began I relished the opportunity to share my experiences with Korean authorities.
So what happened?
The police recommended to prosecutors that the case be dropped. I just received a brief summary of the prosecutor's decision, but I am getting an English translation of the seven-page document soon. Essentially it was ruled that the public interest factor outweighed concerns about sexual content.
So what did you learn from this experience?
I learned that my site is having a far greater effect that I could have dreamed of. The fact they went to so much effort to silence me, I think, speaks volumes.
Do you plan to continue this work?
Yes, absolutely. First, I find the topic endlessly fascinating and second, I know my efforts have helped people and, to some extent, hindered the activities of what are essentially criminal organisations. That's a good feeling.
http://www.vice.com/en_au/read/how-a-south-korean-cult-tried-and-failed-to-sue-an-australian-school-teacher-for-defamation
Inside the sinister Hitler-loving Korean sex cult luring young Australian girls into being 'spiritual brides' for a serial rapist
ReplyDeleteJesus Morning Star is a South Korean cult founded by Jung Myung-seok
· The group is believed to have spread to Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra
· They lure new members through front groups such as modelling classes
· Members say they were recruited in universities and shopping centres
· They say group enforces sleep deprivation and severing of ties with family
· Female members are told they will be purified by having sex with Jung
· One member flew to Seoul to visit Jung where he is imprisoned for rape
· Hundreds of women claim to have been sexually assaulted by the leader
By NELSON GROOM, FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA May 20, 2016
A notorious cult which allegedly brainwashes young women into having sex with a serial rapist is luring potential members in major cities across Australia.
South Korean group Jesus Morning Star (JMS) - who praise Hitler and preach members will be purified by having sex with their leader - are believed to be recruiting in shopping centres and universities in Canberra, Sydney, and Melbourne.
The quasi-Christian sect was founded in 1980 by Jung Myung-seok (JMS), who is serving a 10-year-prison sentence in Seoul for raping and molesting his followers. He is due to walk free in 2017.
The highly secretive group, also known as Providence, is believed to have spread to Australia through a number of front organisations, including fashion modelling classes and bible studies.
Members say they are groomed into following a 'doctrine' which enforces sleep deprivation and encourages severing ties with family in order to be 'spiritual brides' for Jung.
Former followers have told Daily Mail Australia of the devastating impact the cult had on their lives and said they were left psychologically and emotionally scarred after leaving.
Elizabeth, who chose not to give her full name for fear of reprisal, was a member of the JMS's Canberra fraction for 18 months.
'I was shopping inside the Canberra Centre in April 2011. A Korean woman came over and said she was holding a Christian art show. It looked good so I thought I would check it out.'
After meeting the group's local leader she moved in with them later that year and was subjected to the indoctrination process, which includes sleep deprivation and a restricted diet.
'We had to wake up at 3am everyday to pray because they said this brought us closer to god. It's a mind control technique: when you're deprived of sleep you can't critically think.'
Teachings centered on the 'Messianic' leader Jung, who was depicted as a living Deity who had been falsely accused and persecuted like Jesus Christ.
'They encouraged us to write letters to him like he was our lover. He wrote sexually explicit replies saying things like 'your white skin arouses me,' or 'your vagina would look pretty.'
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The group then asked her to fly to Seoul to visit him in Daejon prison, where he was locked up in 2009 on charges of rape and molestation after several years as a fugitive.
ReplyDelete'I spent 15 minutes with him and three other members. He blew kisses at us and knew all our names and how we looked from photos in his cell. It was very surreal.'
Elizabeth said she was told to recruit members by telling them 'you look pretty, have you thought of being a model?,' before inviting them to front fashion classes.
After months of sleep deprivation and regulated eating, she was hospitalised with an eating disorder in 2012.
'It turned out to be a blessing in disguise, because when I got out I moved back in with my parents, who organised an exit counselor to speak with me.'
'It was a devastating realisation to learn the truth. I was left mentally and physically broken.'
Members of the Canberra faction are understood to have moved to Melbourne following scrutiny into their controversial practices.
Another woman, who wished not be named, said she was recruited in early 2014 inside University of Melbourne, where the group is believed to still be actively recruiting.
'They asked me to fill out a survey about the class we were in. It seemed friendly enough, so I agreed to meet for one of their classes.'
After attending one of bible studies she was initially struck by some of their bizarre teachings - such as a holy reading of Adolf Hitler.
'Part of the teachings explored the idea of God's punishment. They said the holocaust was his mark of atonement because Jewish people killed Jesus. They told us Hitler was a vessel from god.'
She said girls were pressured to dress up for Jung and refrain from talking to the opposite sex so as to be 'spiritual brides' for him.
'I started recruiting for more members. I was told to look for virgins, and encouraged new members to wear white as much as possible to show Jung their purity.'
Eventually her parents staged an intervention, and she was deprogrammed by a cult expert. But for some families, the warning signs come too late.
One father said his daughter was recruited in Sydney Uni, and after being brainwashed by the group she was ordered to move to Western Australia.
'I only learned she had moved there when I saw her on one of their sites. It took a long time to pieces together the reality she had been told to move by the group.
Since his daughter was over 18 he could not seek the help of police to help track her down.
'I'm powerless to find her. I get a generic email from her every couple of months but aside from that we have no contact.'
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He says he believes JMS still recruits at Sydney Uni and Broadway Shopping centre through a different front organisations.
ReplyDeletePeter Daley, a Canberra born University lecturer who now lives in South Korea, has spent over a decade researching JMS and writing about them online in the hope of raising awareness.
'JMS is dangerous beyond assaults from the leader. The sleep deprivation and the stress caused when members cut ties with their family is incredibly damaging to members health.'
'And he is due out next year with no signs of rehabilitation. The numbers of girls that have visited him in jail suggest he is not going to change his ways any time soon.'
He said universities should be doing more to educate about the dangers of the group given they are known to target campuses.
'I think they have a duty of care to educate students about the dangers of the group. Many former members were recruited on their university campus'.'
A University of Melbourne spokesperson said they were not aware of the group but advised students who are involved to contact their Safer Community Program.
'We have an industry-leading Safer Community Program, and we have been very active in raising awareness of the program, and the support the University can offer students who experience situations like this.'
A spokesperson for Sydney University also denied being aware of the group but urged students to report groups misrepresenting their activities.
'Any behaviour by individuals or groups on campus misrepresenting themselves or their activities to students should be reported to Campus Security so that appropriate action can be taken.'
Daily Mail Australia has also contacted a spokesperson for Jesus Morning Star for comment.
WHO IS JESUS MORNING STAR
· Founded in 1980 by Jung Myung-seok
· Started in South Korea and spread across Asia
· Followers identify Jung as the Second Coming of Christ
· Female members told they will be purified by having sex with Seok
· Hundreds of women have claimed they were raped or sexually abused by Jung
· Group is highly secretive in nature
· Has a history of violence against critics
· Recruits members through front groups like modelling classes
· Reports of 240 branches in South Korea alone
WHAT DO THEY DO IN AUSTRALIA
· Active in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra
· Have several front groups to lure members
· Recruit in major universities including Sydney Uni and Melbourne Uni
· Praise Adolf Hitler in their teachings
· Enforce sleep deprivation and restricted diets on members
· Encourage them to sever ties with family
· Tell them to dress up for Jung and refrain from talking to the opposite sex
· Encouraged to recruit virgins into the group
· Arrange for members to fly to South Korea to visit Jungin jail
· Unclear how many members there are
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3595764/Cult-luring-Australian-girls-brides-South-Korean-rapist.html
Jung Myung Seok, founder of the South Korean religious cult JMS, sentenced to 23 years in prison by the district court for raping followers of his church
ReplyDeleteALLKPOP
AKP STAFF
On December 22 KST, the 12th Criminal Division of the Daejeon District Court sentenced Jung Myung Seok (78), the founder of the Christian religious cult JMS (Jesus Morning Star, also known as Providence), to 23 years in prison for sexually assaulting three of his female followers from 2018 through 2021.
The infamous cult founder, whose heinous sexual crimes against female members of his church once again came to light earlier this year through the Netflix docuseries 'In the Name of God: A Holy Betrayal', was once sentenced to 10 years in prison between 2008 and 2018 after being found guilty of sexually abusing and assaulting four female followers from 2001 through 2006. Immediately after being released from 2018, Jung Myung Seok proceeded to commit sexual crimes within his church once again, this time sexually abusing and assaulting three female followers of JMS 23 times between February of 2018 through September of 2021. Two of the victims are known to be former JMS members of foreign nationality.
Initially, the prosecution demanded a total of 30 years in prison for Jung Myung Seok, claiming, "In February 2009, Jung Myung Seok was sentenced to 10 years in prison for raping female members of his church. After his release from prison in February of 2018, Jung showed no signs of reflection, immediately committing the same crimes again, this time against 3 victims for a period of approximately 3 years."
The prosecution continued, "Jung and his JMS followers brainwashed the victims into thinking that Jung was a messiah, then abused their faith to commit sexual crimes. The victims are currently suffering from severe trauma and wish to see Jung facing harsh punishment."
Meanwhile, the JMS cult, founded by Jung Myung Seok in 1980, is believed to be a massive cult with several overseas branches. Key leaders of the cult have also attempted to destroy or temper evidence related to Jung Myung Seok's sexual crimes, even going to lengths as to countersue victims for defamation and accusing them of lying and fabricating stories.
While the possibility of Jung's side appealing the court decision remains open, it's also known that 18 additional victims have reported Jung for sexual assault, and investigations surrounding these cases are still ongoing.
https://www.allkpop.com/article/2023/12/jung-myung-seok-founder-of-the-south-korean-religious-cult-jms-sentenced-to-23-years-in-prison-by-the-district-court-for-raping-followers-of-his-church
Controversial Updates on J.Y. Park’s Endeavors Spark Cult Leader Rumors
ReplyDeleteby Ella Bennet, MSN February 23, 2024
Suspicions of cult involvement resurface for J.Y. Park.
The music industry icon J.Y. Park, the force behind the establishment of JYP Entertainment, is known for launching some of the most successful idols in K-Pop history. With decades of experience, he has cultivated a loyal following.
Instances of concern have been raised not about J.Y. Park’s music but rather his religious endeavors, which have fallen under intense scrutiny due to alleged connections with the controversial Salvation Sect, a group implicated in the catastrophic Sewol Ferry incident.
In South Korea, the specter of cults is particularly alarming due to the exposure of various harmful organizations, including the notorious JMS (Jeong Myeong Seok or Jesus Morning Star). With Netflix’s series In The Name Of God: A Holy Betrayal shining an international light on these groups, public attention has intensified.
The shocking revelation of a cult connection with K-Pop album distributor Synnara has further confirmed the pervasive nature of such organizations.
A fan recently brought attention to a video showing J.Y. Park’s role as a pastor, causing a stir online.
J.Y. Park publicly announced the weekly church service schedule for Firstfruit, the religious group he is associated with, offering both English and Korean services and providing a link to their American website for further details.
To access information on attending in-person services, one must register on the website, which also offers virtual service options.
The U.S. branch of First Fruits initiated operations approximately a month ago, with J.Y Park releasing an introductory video on February 18, 2024. The Christian evangelical approach of spreading the “good news” by First Fruits is not intrinsically suspect.
However, it is not uncommon for Korean-based cults to have international outreach strategies aimed at recruitment.
Netizens have reignited “cult leader” accusations in light of J.Y. Park’s recent undertakings.
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FAQs about J.Y. Park’s Alleged Cult Connections
ReplyDeleteQ: What exactly are the allegations against J.Y. Park?
A: J.Y. Park has faced allegations relating to supposed connections with the Salvation Sect, a group implicated in the Sewol Ferry tragedy. These allegations have resurfaced due to his recent religious activities, which some speculate may be linked to cult practices.
Q: Has J.Y. Park admitted to these allegations?
A: There has been no official admission from J.Y. Park regarding the allegations of being a cult leader or having connections with cults. He has been open about his religious activities and affiliations with the organization Firstfruit, but the accusations remain speculative.
Q: Why are people concerned about cults in South Korea?
A: Cults in South Korea have come under scrutiny, especially after several high-profile incidents revealed dangerous and illegal practices. Public concern has intensified, driving skepticism and scrutiny towards any individual or group with potential cult ties.
Q: Can anyone attend the services offered by Firstfruit?
A: According to the Firstfruit website, interested participants can attend virtual or in-person services, but registration is necessary for the latter. This is the organization with which J.Y. Park has shared a schedule of services.
Conclusion
The recent activities of J.Y. Park have once again sparked discussions and concerns over alleged cult affiliations, particularly in a country where cult activity has led to national tragedies. Despite his long-standing presence in the music industry and his role in propelling K-Pop to global heights, these rumors underscore the complex relationship between celebrity status and personal beliefs or practices. As the situation develops, fans and critics alike are awaiting concrete evidence or clarifications surrounding the divisive accusations against J.Y. Park.
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/controversial-updates-on-jy-park-s-endeavors-spark-cult-leader-rumors/ar-BB1iMWMi