Contractor sought to destroy video in sex-for-favors scandal

Yoon Jung-cheon, a contractor who allegedly hosted and filmed a sex party attended by a senior prosecutor who later became vice justice minister, appears to have sought to destroy the video during a police probe, a voice recording showed.

Kim Hak-ui stepped down as vice justice minister in March 2013 amid allegations that he attended the orgy at Yoon’s villa. Police and prosecutors cleared Kim of sex crimes in 2013, but a special panel at the Justice Ministry recently recommended that the case be reopened. 

Broadcaster KBS obtained and reported a recording of Kim’s telephone conversation in early 2013 with a senior police official in which Yoon can be heard asking the official whether he has to worry about the video.

When the senior police official says he doesn’t know, Yoon asks him, “Didn’t you retrieve the video?”

The senior police official then asks Yoon whether Kim Hak-ui knows about the existence of the video and Yoon replies that he does, saying they took videos of each other.

Should the recorded telephone conversation be authenticated by investigators, it is expected to work against Kim, who denies knowing Yoon and having made the video.

The video was leaked during an adultery probe against Yoon. Kim retired from public service over the scandal after serving six days as the vice justice minister.

Kim has been accused of raping women at Yoon’s villa. A woman who said Kim raped her at Yoon’s villa told KBS in an interview earlier this month that she had also seen Yoon giving Kim white envelopes containing money on several occasions.

She also said Kim told Yoon he had “made calls” in connection with Yoon’s favors.

Kim sought to leave the country last week, but was stopped at the airport after the Justice Ministry issued an “emergency” travel ban.

By Kim So-hyun (sophie@heraldcorp.com)