Fraud Ring Sentenced to Prison
Targeted Middle-Aged and Older Adults on Danggeun Market
Posed as Religious Figures to Deceive Victims
Used Burner Phones and Cryptocurrency to Launder Money
A group that committed fraud through a secondhand goods trading platform in Jeju has been sentenced to prison. They primarily targeted middle-aged and older adults, carrying out their scams on the used goods trading app "Danggeun Market."
According to Yonhap News, on May 13, Jeju District Court Criminal Division 4, presided over by Chief Judge Jeon Sungjun, sentenced B, a man in his 30s who was indicted and detained on fraud charges, to five years in prison. A, a woman in her 20s, was sentenced to one year in prison. Two accomplices, C and D, both in their 30s who were also detained and brought to trial on the same charges, were each sentenced to one year in prison with three years of probation.
The group designated rural areas, where people are less familiar with secondhand goods transactions, as their crime zones. They lured victims by offering high-priced items such as popular mobile farm cabins, containers, and cranes at low prices.
From September 2023 to January 12 of this year, A acted as a seller for a large-scale fraud organization based in Vietnam. At the beginning of her crimes, she deceived people by claiming to sell "League of Legends World Championship Final tickets," among other schemes. In total, she committed 575 cases of online secondhand goods fraud, swindling approximately 354 million won.
During the crimes, the perpetrators pretended to be religious figures such as "pastors" or "nuns" and targeted middle-aged and older adults. When victims expressed their intention to purchase and asked to check the goods, the scammers would claim to have prior commitments and insisted on non-face-to-face transactions.
In cases where in-person transactions took place, they would summon two potential buyers to the location of the item, making sure neither knew the other was also a buyer. They then deceived both into believing that only one person was the seller. As a result, some victims mistakenly transferred the payment to the scammer, believing them to be the legitimate seller.
The group operated in an organized manner, installing four computers, fifteen burner phones, and internet routers, and followed a regular work schedule. They obtained burner bank accounts by paying 50,000 to 100,000 won each through social networking services (SNS) and used the proceeds of their crimes to purchase cryptocurrency. They then laundered the money by converting the cryptocurrency back into cash.
A and the others admitted all the charges in court. The court stated that the nature of their crimes was particularly egregious, as they targeted good citizens such as college students saving their allowance and parents buying gifts for their children, and sentenced all members to prison. However, the court explained that it considered factors such as A's admission of guilt, her remorse, and the partial return of stolen funds when determining the sentences.
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