Prosecution Appeals Acquittal of Gaseyeon Cast Who Made 'Jo Min Porsche' Remark

Appeal Filed After Reviewing Video Content and Statement Circumstances

The prosecution has appealed the first-instance acquittal of the cast members of the YouTube channel 'Garosero Yeonguso' (Gaseyeon), who were indicted on charges of defamation.

Lawyer Kang Yong-seok and others appeared on the Gaseyeon YouTube channel in August 2019 and were indicted last September for allegedly making false statements by revealing a photo of a Porsche parked at Pusan National University Medical School and claiming that "Mr. Jo drives a red Porsche."

The Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office Trial Division 4 (Chief Prosecutor Kang Min-jung) announced on the 27th, "The court recognized that the defendants' statements were clearly false, and considering the overall content of the video, the circumstances of the statements, and the context before and after, it was judged that the victim's honor was defamed, so an appeal was filed."

In a YouTube broadcast by 'Garoseoro Research Institute' (Gaseyeon), lawyer Kang Yong-seok, who was indicted for defamation after claiming that Cho Min, the daughter of former Minister of Justice Cho Kuk, drives a Porsche, former MBC reporter Kim Se-ui, and former Sports World reporter Kim Yong-ho are heading to the courtroom to attend the first trial sentencing hearing held on the morning of the 20th at the Seoul Central District Court in Seocho-gu.
[Photo by Yonhap News]

On the 20th, Judge Lee Jong-min of the Seoul Central District Court Criminal Division 3 single bench acquitted lawyer Kang Yong-seok, former MBC reporter Kim Se-ui, and former Sports World reporter Kim Yong-ho, who were indicted on charges of defamation under the Information and Communications Network Act.

At that time, the court acknowledged that "the victim did not drive a red Porsche at that time," but ruled that "even if expressions that defamed the victim's honor were made, the content of the suspicion pertains to a public interest related to former Minister Jo," and therefore could not be punished.

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