Middle School Girl Forced Into Prostitution (Gwangju)

[Brian]

Middle School Girl Forced Into Prostitution

Police have arrested three suspects on charges of detaining a middle school girl and forcing her into prostitution with 800 men including a college professor and a doctor. According to police, the suspects held Jeon, a 14-year-old middle school student, against her will in motels in Gwangju, South Jeolla province and forced her to prostitute herself. The suspects are charged with beating Jeon, who pleaded with them to let her go, once every two or three days and burning her hands with cigarettes.

Chonbuk Provincial Police Agency said some 800 men bought sex with the girl, including a public servant and professionals such as a college professor, a doctor and a pharmacist. The suspects allegedly posted articles that hinted at prostitution on chat forums to lure customers. Police said they forced Jeon to have sex with customers at least five times a day and took all her earnings amounting to some W120 million (US$1=W928). Jeon managed to run away to an uncle’s home in Jeonju, North Jeolla Province on May 22, taking advantage of her captors’ inattention. Police arrested the suspects when they went to Jeonju to recapture their victim. Police will request arrest warrants for 10 customers who knew Jeon had been detained and assaulted.

http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200706/200706050018.html

Nobody in her family or school noticed she was missing?

edit: Here's another article on it:

The suspects stayed in an adjacent room at the motel to keep an eye on the victim during the ordeal, police said, but she escaped on May 22. She contacted an uncle in Jeonju, and the police were finally notified. The three suspects went to the home of the uncle, apparently intent on recapturing their victim. Police were waiting and the three were arrested.
“There was a customer who was a doctor and he saw the bruises on my body, but he still returned 10 times,” the victim was quoted as saying by the police. “Men saw my bruises and wounds, but they did not care. I told them that I was a prisoner, but they just turned away. They were afraid because they were engaged in the sex trade.”
The police said they have obtained 800 phone numbers of men suspected of having sex with the girl. About 40 of them have already been questioned and face charges for having sex with a minor. The police said they will expand the investigation to include all suspected customers.
The police said the victim’s customers ranged from doctors and teachers to students and soldiers.
One of the men questioned is a university professor.
“I did not know she was a minor. Please do not let my university know about this,” the professor was quoted as saying.

http://joongangdaily.joins.com/article/view.asp?aid=2876443

[Samuel]

I hope that professor gets ass raped in jail. he didn't know--whatever.

[AlexMokpo]

No kidding, eh?  How can you not know someone is 14 y/o??  That's YOUNG...especially in Korea, where 14 y/o's look about 11!

[Jen]

That sickens me.

What surprises me though is they released the name of the girl, but not the names of the perpetrators?  What the hell?

[AlexMokpo]

Yeah, no kidding, eh?
Every time I hear of bad things happening in this country, it's the victims who are identified, while the bad person gets their names censored and faces blurred.
What the f**k. 
I even tried to talk about this with my co-teachers in a workshop, telling them that's like telling bad people that their actions are okay.  They wouldn't accept it.  "It looks bad on their family too"  blah blah blah.  Well, maybe that would put more social pressure on people not to do bad things if their families would also be shamed.

[Arsalan]

I don't normally reply to news threads, simply because I find myself having the urge to utter the worst obscenities imaginable.  I'll spare everyone that much, but I do whole heartedly agree with your concerns, why identify the victim and not the criminal?—what the f**k indeed.  It's not backwards, it's simply lame brained and pathetic enough to make the handling of these matters seem like criminal offenses in their turn, where's the common sense?

[rachandra]

that poor girl... maybe someone should adopt her and take her back to canada instead of a cat. for all that i hate north america's sensationalist attitude towards the news, it's still comforting to know that we'd have been in an uproar if something like that happened... and those bastards would have their faces plastered all over the place!