Former soccer participant Lee Chun-soo, who gained fame as a member of Korea’s 2002 World Cup squad and now runs a YouTube channel with 780,000 subscribers, has been accused of fraud involving tons of of thousands and thousands of received.
In accordance with CBS No Minimize Information on Tuesday, the Jeju Provincial Police Company booked Lee on costs of fraud underneath the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Particular Financial Crimes. The case was transferred from the Seogwipo Police Station, the place a longtime acquaintance filed a grievance in opposition to Lee final month.
The acquaintance, who described his relationship with Lee as shut sufficient to “name one another brothers,” claimed that the 2 fell out over cash. Within the grievance, he mentioned that Lee had borrowed residing bills in November 2018, saying, “I don’t have any regular earnings proper now, however I’ll repay you by the tip of 2023 as soon as I begin working a YouTube channel and a soccer academy.”
Trusting his good friend, he transferred cash to Lee a number of instances — a complete of about 132 million received ($96,000) over 9 transactions, together with an preliminary 3 million received fee despatched to Lee’s spouse’s account. Nevertheless, he claims that Lee lower off contact round late 2021 and didn’t repay any of the funds by the promised deadline.
He additionally alleged that Lee persuaded him to speculate 500 million received in a international trade futures buying and selling web site run by one other acquaintance, promising month-to-month dividends and the return of principal upon request.
Whereas he initially obtained small revenue funds, he mentioned the second acquaintance stopped sending cash after two months and solely refunded 160 million received. He submitted a written admission from the second individual acknowledging the debt, together with financial institution switch data, as a part of the grievance.
In response, Lee’s consultant admitted that he had obtained cash however denied any fraudulent intent. “It’s true that cash was given, however (the acquaintance) was doing nicely financially on the time and supplied it voluntarily,” the consultant informed CBS No Minimize Information.
“Fraud requires intent to deceive, and there was none. The declare of fraud shouldn’t be true.” The consultant added that Lee “is prepared to repay the cash” however firmly denied the separate allegation associated to funding solicitation. “He by no means launched or inspired anybody to put money into that web site.”
Lee rose to nationwide stardom as a part of the Korean staff that reached the semifinals of the 2002 FIFA World Cup. After retiring in 2015, he transitioned to soccer administration and later grew to become a tv character.
This text is translated by generative AI and edited by The Korea Instances.
