Ex-T-ara Areum Reportedly Threatened Acquaintances To Borrow Money

On April 11th, Youtuber Lee Jin-ho uploaded a new video titled “Why did she turn to be an AfreecaTV BJ?”.

Previously, Lee Jin-ho claimed that Areum, who used to be active as a member of the girl group T-ara, borrowed money from fans and her followers. Areum denied the allegation and explained that her SNS was hacked. 

On the 5th, Areum opened an AfreecaTV channel and made her debut as a BJ. Soon after, she announced the news of her pregnancy and promised that she would definitely repay the money because she had a reason to borrow it.

Lee Jin-ho disclosed that Areum’s victims are currently in a “mental breakdown” state as they are observing the female singer’s moves. Accordingly, Areum is preventing the victims from raising issues by blocking them if they contact and ask her to return the money. The ex-T-ara member also made excuses, such as hacking, to continue borrowing money.

Lee Jin-ho said some victims already sued Areum and her boyfriend Seo. However, as more victims emerged, the YouTuber decided to deal with the related content again. 

Citing the words of an informant who used the same hospital room as Areum, Lee Jin-ho emphasized that Areum did not seem to go to the hospital for surgery and she looked completely fine on the outside, doubting whether Areum really made an extreme choice.

Regarding the hospital medical record Areum showed, Lee Jin-ho suspected that her hospitalization due to extreme choice might not be covered by insurance as the record show a payment of 180,390 won.

Lee Jin-ho also claimed that Areum and her boyfriend Seo are still borrowing money using the same method even after the incident this time became publicized. He then revealed the transcript of a victim who claimed to have been financially extorted and threatened by Areum.

The victim’s husband, A, said in a conversation with Areum on April 7th, “If it were 100 or 200 million won, I could understand if you talked about will, but doing that with 100,000 or 200,000 won seems a bit rude. My wife is also very upset.”

Areum defended herself, saying that she had difficulty even getting a small amount of money in her state of being hurt by untrue things, and that she was in a situation where even getting money for her children to go to a protective facility was difficult. A then asked Areum to apologize to his wife for threatening to write a will because of 100,000 won.

After the call ended, Seo called A. Seo said “You know I don’t play by the rules, right?” and asked for A’s address, and even cursed at him.

Lee Jin-ho also claimed that there were victims who lent money to Areum and Seo and ended up losing their credit information. He added that the two handed over the victims as collateral witnesses in the process of borrowing money from a loan company.

Lee Jin-ho concluded the video by expressing his hope that the victims will not suffer any further harm, as he believes that the likelihood of getting the money back from the two, who currently have poor credit status, is low.