More complicated answer? Prostitution, no matter what you choose to call it, is rampant and prevalent in South Korea. Simple answer: the individuals all have powerful positions and/or can buy the police investigator. Why aren’t there police investigations and why aren’t they arrested?

After all, prostitution is illegal and engaging in prostitution and paying for prostitution is considered a criminal act. If this is the case, isn’t this essentially prostitution? That’s a common question. These men would then sponsor the celebrity, giving her designer and expensive stuff, and would help her get roles and commercials, in return for one little thing - sex. It is not only present, but it is easily available, with organizations and ‘clubs’ dedicated to using low ranked and rookie celebrities and delivering them to wealthy and important men. Every entertainment industry has some form of the casting couch, yes, but there are few that come close to the systematic way that it is present in South Korea. Sponsorship is the dirty, barely kept secret of the Korean entertainment industry. As for the men named? They were all cleared. Of those named in her letter, only her manager and CEO were sentenced to jail for two years. In the months and years that followed her death, the eleven names somehow became 31 in a list passed around the internet, news stories became inaccurate as the truth became increasingly blurred, contradictory stories from just about everyone involved, allegations of computer hacking, and government interference was rampant.īut one fact continues to be held true – Jang Ja-yeon was forced into sexual acts with these influential people, and was forced into these sponsorship relations by her manager. In her letter, where she identifies herself as a “weak and powerless actress” who wants to “escape from all this pain,” she listed eleven prominent individuals, one of whom was the producer of Boys Over Flowers. She goes into detail, claiming that she was forced to sexually entertain these men over 110 times, and accused them of sexual coercion, rape, and battery. In these letters, she told a tale that had awoken the fury of the Korean public. In a way, it reflected the high suicide rates Korea is known for – here was another young actress who killed herself for reasons unknown.Īnd then her suicide letters became public. The apparent suicide of the actress that was just starting to get her name recognized after her role in the hit drama series, Boys Over Flowers, hit hard, not just to her fans, but to the general public as well.

On March 7, 2009, the actress Jang Ja-yeon was found hanging on a stairway bannister by her older sister.

Names of people in jang ja yeon case