After 4 years, the crucial informant in the Burning Sun scandal, which implicated Seungri and accomplices, has been revealed.
Despite having occurred in 2019, Burning Sun remains one of the biggest scandals in the history of the South Korean entertainment industry. All the directly involved individuals such as Seungri, Jung Joon Young, and Choi Jong Hoon have already been imprisoned, and the former BIGBANG member recently resurfaced after serving his sentence.
Notably, today (June 24th), details regarding the “golden phone” of Jung Joon Young, who was a key figure in the sex chat group, as well as the person responsible for exposing crucial evidence contained in this phone have officially been disclosed.
In 2019, a Korean television network exposed Jung Joon Young by revealing a series of text message evidence from his sex chat group, which harmed numerous female victims. At the same time, Seungri was implicated with evidence related to procuring prostitution, and this confidential information was found on this “golden phone”. Various scandals of nightclubs, sex trafficking, and hidden camera recordings were unveiled, involving various names alongside Seungri and Jung Joon Young.
All in all, it is undeniable that the “golden phone” is a key evidence in exposing the crimes of numerous famous figures in the Korean entertainment industry. Surprisingly, the person responsible for revealing the “golden phone” turned out to be a technician working at a phone repair shop, who has received a reward of approximately 50 million won (around 40,000 USD).
According to Korean media outlet Chosun, this is an extremely large amount of reward, likely due to the magnitude of the case. Notably, the details regarding the evidence and the reward were only disclosed by the Korean media today, 4 years after the case broke out.
According to Chosun, this technician sent KakaoTalk messages containing evidence to SBS in February 2019, which included Seungri’s messages requesting prostitution services for guests at the Burning Sun nightclub. One month later, the technician sent additional messages containing evidence regarding Jung Joon Young and his group of friends in the sex chatroom.
It is known that Jung Joon Young left his phone, which contained thousands of inappropriate messages, for repair at the shop. After recovering the messages from 2015 to 2016, the technician decided to immediately notify the largest television network in Korea, SBS, about the acquired information.
The police subsequently launched an investigation, and the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission of South Korea participated in solving the case. After a long period of time, the Burning Sun case officially came to a close.
According to the final verdict, Seungri was sentenced to 3 years in prison for 9 charges. However, after several court sessions, the former member of BIGBANG’s sentence was reduced to only 18 months, and he was released on February 9th, to the surprise of the public. Jung Joon Young was sentenced to 5 years in prison, and it is expected that he will be released at the end of 2025. Choi Jong Hoon received a sentence of 2 years and 6 months in prison but was released in November 2021. Related individuals such as Lee Jong Hyun and Yong Junhyung have both left their music groups and disappeared from the entertainment industry.
Source: K14
