Spire Entertainment released a video this Tuesday afternoon of OMEGA X member LEE HWICHAN groping the agency’s former CEO Kang Seong Hee.
The group’s former agency leaked surveillance camera footage from July 11, 2022, showing the OMEGA X singer touching Kang Seong Hee’s body “against her will.”
The footage was reportedly lost until two weeks ago, but was recently restored and will be used as evidence to file charges against the OMEGA X member for sexual assault, Spire Entertainment said.
Spire Entertainment held a press conference Tuesday afternoon in southern Seoul “to announce that former Spire Entertainment CEO Kang Seong Hee is not a criminal but a victim of sexual harassment,” contrary to reports. the group’s claim that the CEO had assaulted members in 2022.
The conference was attended by Hwang Seong Woo, Kang Seong Hee’s husband and current CEO of Spire Entertainment, and lawyer Kim Tae Woo of Jeha Law Firm. Kang Seong Hee, who was reported to the police for sexually harassing and assaulting members of the group OMEGA X in 2022, was not present.
On October 22, 2022, a fan uploaded an audio recording to Twitter, claiming that it was of member JAEHAN being yelled at and pushed around by CEO Kang during the group’s stay in Los Angeles as part of its tour in the United States.
The members held a press conference the following month, stating that they had been subjected to verbal, physical, and sexual abuse since November 2021 and that Kang Seong Hee had threatened them, saying that “there would be no next album” if they refused to comply with his wishes.
The members requested an injunction on their exclusive contracts with Spire Entertainment, which was approved by the Seoul Eastern District Court on January 11, 2023.
Seven months later, Spire Entertainment accused OMEGA X of conspiring with its current agency IPQ Entertainment to prematurely terminate its exclusive contract with Spire Entertainment to join IPQ Entertainment, through an act characterized as artist tampering.
Kang Seong Hee insists she was wrongly portrayed as an abusive and robbed CEO of a “boyband” the company invested 10 billion won ($7.5 million) in to create, while that IPQ Entertainment CEO Yoon Hye Young claims that Kang Seong Hee’s violence towards the members was verified by the court and that IPQ Entertainment only offered to help save the members afterwards.
According to Kang Seong Hee, the members insulted her in order to make her scream on camera, and the parts where the members provoked her were deleted. She was also accused of sexually harassing the members, such as touching their legs, but she explained that such acts only happened when she was trying to comfort the members when they were going through a difficult time.
“Despite being the victim, Kang Seong Hee was reluctant to press charges or disclose evidence because she didn’t want to be the one to turn the young OMEGA X members into sex offenders,” Spire Entertainment said.
“But the assumptions about her have reached a point where it can no longer be ignored, so she decided to reveal the surveillance camera footage.”
A case with several twists and turns. What is really going on, has the evidence from OMEGA X members been truncated? Is Spire Entertainment’s CCTV video real or is it a montage. Many questions that justice will have to unravel and prove so that the victims are protected.
Journalist: Shawn
Translator: Shawn
Source: Spire Entertainment press conference
