U.S. Beef Fears Exploited

Digital Chosun Ilbo – South Korea

Aug.5,2008

A college student who collected donations over the Internet seeking to place a newspaper ad looking for witnesses to the rumored murder of a female university student by riot police, is said to have used the money left over from the ad on alcohol and prostitutes. The student, identified only by his surname “Kim,” is a student council leader at a university. Starting on July 8, Kim collected W19.26 million (US$1=W1,017) in donations from 950 people through the Agora debate forum on the popular Internet portal Daum. He spent W14 million of this money to place a front-page ad in the July 16 edition of the Hankyoreh daily looking for witnesses, while he transferred the remainder to his own bank account and used the cash to go to brothels and nightclubs.

This rumor was started by a reporter working for a newspaper based outside Seoul, identified only by his surname Choi, who doctored a photograph of a riot police officer getting cardiopulmonary resuscitation after collapsing from breathing difficulties. The photo was made to appear as if it showed a student who had been strangled to death by riot police. Choi even spread the lie that some riot police threw down their shields in defiance after learning of the student’s death. When he was arrested, Choi confessed and said he did it because he wanted to become a star in cyberspace.

Kim then said he could not trust the explanations offered by the police and placed an ad looking for witnesses; when the donations piled in, he started getting other ideas. Kim’s computer is said to have been filled with word files advocating North Korea’s “Juche” or self-reliance ideology. It is simply pathetic that we must fall victim to the acts of such people.

The candlelight vigils, which began as genuine expressions of worry over a government that was negligent about the health of the public, were hijacked by people harboring childish desires to become “stars.” The result has been the degradation of downtown Seoul into a lawless area. This incident once again reminds us of the danger of lies spread through the Internet.

english.chosun.com