Jo Joo-bin, Sex Crime Specialized Tribunal to Hear Case... Assigned to Criminal Division 30

Whether to Merge with the Accomplices Case to Be Decided Later

[Asia Economy Reporter Seongpil Cho] The case of Jo Joo-bin (24), who was arrested and indicted on charges of producing and distributing sexual exploitation materials on Telegram, has been assigned to a specialized criminal panel for sex crimes. This panel is different from the one handling the cases of his accomplices Kang Mo (24, social service worker) and Lee Mo (16, student), who were indicted earlier. Whether the cases will be consolidated will be decided by the assigned panel.

According to the court on the 14th, the Seoul Central District Court assigned Jo's case to the Criminal Division 30 (Chief Judge Lee Hyun-woo), a panel dedicated to sex crime cases. A court official stated, "This was the result of a random computerized assignment." The Seoul Central District Court has four specialized criminal panels for sex crimes, including Criminal Division 30. The assignment was made through computerized allocation among these panels.

Jo will stand trial in the same courtroom as his accomplices who have already been detained and indicted. These include Kang, who is accused of conspiring with Jo to murder a young girl in the "Doctor's Room," and Lee, known as Jo's successor. The prosecution indicted them together under a single indictment, requesting that they be tried jointly.

The prosecution plans to request the court to conduct a consolidated trial once Jo's initial trial procedures begin. Currently, Kang's case is being handled by Criminal Division 33 (Chief Judge Son Dong-hwan) of the Seoul Central District Court, and Lee's case is being heard by Judge Park Hyun-sook of the Criminal Division 22 Single Judge Court at the same court. Accordingly, whether Jo's case and those of his accomplices will be separated or consolidated will be determined by the respective panels.

Earlier, the Digital Sex Crime Special Investigation Task Force (Team Leader Deputy Chief Prosecutor Yoo Hyun-jung) of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office indicted Jo the previous day on 14 charges including production and distribution of child and youth pornography under the Youth Protection Act and forcible molestation. The accomplices Kang and Lee were also indicted without detention on the same charges as Jo.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.