hankyoreh

Demonstrators outside Jongno Police Station in Seoul call for stiff punishments against Cho Ju-bin, the operator of a Telegram chatroom that circulated videos of sexual exploitation, as well as all its members on Apr. 25. (photo pool)

A South Korean court has issued a warrant for the extradition and detention of a 24-year-old individual surnamed Son, who administered a website called Welcome to Video. Son’s website is said to be the world’s largest site focusing on the sexual exploitation of children.

On Apr. 20, the Seoul High Court approved a request by the Seoul High Prosecutors’ Office for an extradition and detention warrant for Son.

The Ministry of Justice (MOJ) had been engaged in related discussions since receiving a criminal extradition request for Son from the US Department of Justice in April of last year.

“After determining that the charges of ‘international money laundering’ among the counts for which the US was requesting extradition did not overlap with the guilty verdict by the South Korean court, we ordered the Seoul High Public Prosecutors’ Office on Apr. 16 to request an extradition review,” the MOJ said.

After executing Son’s extradition and detention warrant and taking him into custody later this month, the Seoul High Public Prosecutors’ Office plans to request a criminal extradition review by the Seoul High Court. The final determination of Son’s criminal extradition is to be made by the MOJ following the Seoul High Court’s review.

Between June 2015 and March 2018, Son administered Welcome to Video, the world’s largest child exploitation site, which operated within the “dark web.” An investigation found him to have earned some US$370,000 in virtual currency from providing sexually exploitive videos to around 4,000 paying users around the world. One of the videos reportedly involved a six-month-old infant.

In a coordinated international investigation launched in 2017, the South Korean, US, and British governments captured Son along with 373 users in 12 countries. Son was sentenced to 18 months in prison by an appellate court in May of last year and is awaiting release on Apr 27. But the likelihood now appears greater that he will be extradited immediately to the US without release once the Seoul High Court issues a criminal extradition warrant.

By Lim Jae-woo, staff reporter

Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]