Former B.A.P member Himchan once again accused of sexual assault while appealing against previous molestation sentence
Former Kpop idol and member of boy group B.A.P Himchan, reportedly molested two women.
Himchan, who previously received charges on sexual assault in 2018, was sentenced to imprisonment in the first trial, and now accused of being a repeat offender during his appeal trial.
According to insiders from legal circles, on April 17th, Himchan received accusations for sexually harrassing two women while drunk on the stairs outside a pub in Hannam-dong, Yongsan-gu, Seoul. It was also revealed that his alleged victims reported to the police within hours from the incident, and one of them was a foreigner.
The women claimed that it was their first time meeting Himchan, and that the male idol took one of their phones without permission. When asked to return it, Himchan wrapped his hands around the woman’s waist and said: “Let’s go upstairs together”. The other woman, meanwhile, shared: “I felt Himchan’s touch on my chest, so I immediately reacted strongly.”
As of the moment, Himchan’s legal representative has refuted these claims, saying: “As you can see from the CCTV footage, there was unavoidable physical contact, but there was no sexual intention.”
“Himchan was standing on a narrow and steep staircase and another customer opened the stair door and came out, and as a precautionary measure, our client’s hand touched the waist of a woman. We’d like to apologize if such an action had offended the woman, but Himchan did not touch any other woman’s breasts, and the only contact made was for risk prevention purposes. He did not have any sexual intention towards any of the women,” they explained.
The police have secured and are analyzing all CCTVs that show the outside stairs of the pub, and are conducting investigations, including taking witness statements from employees working at the pub.
Himchan debuted in the music industry as a member of the award-winning boy group B.A.P in 2011, but was charged with sexual assault in September 2019 and sentenced to 10 months in prison at the first trial in February last year. He admitted to all charges of forced molestation at the first appeal trial on April 12th, and a second trial is scheduled to be held on June 14th.
Source: Nate
