Videos identifying alleged Miryang perpetrators re-uploaded

A YouTuber who uploaded, and then took down, videos identifying the alleged perpetrators in the Miryang rape case has re-uploaded them.

A list of videos re-uploaded on Sunday by a YouTuber who revealed the alleged identities of the assailants in the Miryang gang rape case in 2004 [SCREEN CAPTURE]

A YouTuber who released videos unveiling the alleged identities of some of the perpetrators of the 2004 Miryang gang rape re-uploaded the videos on Sunday, a day after they were deleted “at the request of the victim.”

The YouTuber, who began revealing the alleged identities of the assailants on June 1, took down all the videos on Saturday as the exposure became controversial after the victim and her family said they never agreed to the reveal.

On Sunday, the YouTuber uploaded two videos containing the identities of two alleged perpetrators again, after deleting every video on the channel and even changing the channel's name the day before.

The YouTuber, who has over 470,000 subscribers as of Sunday afternoon, wrote on the platform's community page on Saturday that the victim’s younger sister reached out sharing the alleged identity of one of the assailants, but later asked that the video be taken down after it was uploaded. The victim’s younger brother also reached out, saying it was right to share the assailants’ identities.

“I had ignored the e-mail sent from the victim’s younger sister,” the YouTuber wrote a day earlier, apologizing for uploading the videos after just communicating with the brother. The videos were deleted as the YouTuber felt "guilty" for continuing to upload them without consent.

The Miryang gang rape case involved at least 44 high school students who repeatedly sexually assaulted a 14-year-old middle school girl, identified by her surname Choi, over the course of a year in Miryang, South Gyeongsang in 2004.

The YouTuber had earlier announced a plan to unveil the alleged identities of 44 perpetrators involved in the case after receiving consent from the victim. Last Wednesday, the Korea Sexual Violence Relief Center, an organization claiming to represent the victim, released a statement saying that the victim and her family never agreed on exposing the identities of the assailants.

In a press release on Saturday, the organization also denied the YouTuber’s claim that the videos were deleted upon their request as they had never communicated.

The exposure of the alleged identities reignited outrage over the incident 20 years ago. A total of five complaints have been submitted to the Gyeongnam Provincial Police Agency for defamation over the uploaded videos as of Friday.

The Miryang gang rape case became famous not only for the horrific nature of the crime, but also for the lenient punishments handed down as well as accusations that the police mistreated the victims and failed to investigate thoroughly.

The number of perpetrators may have been much higher than the 44 named in the case. Both Choi's sister and cousin were also assaulted.

The assailants, born between the years of 1986 and 1988, did not receive any criminal punishment.

At the time, 10 of the assailants who directly took part in the sexual assault were indicted and sentenced to probation, 20 were sent to juvenile detention centers and 14 settled with the victim.

BY CHO JUNG-WOO [cho.jungwoo1@joongang.co.kr]