A heavy prison term was handed down to Jung Myung-seok, 81, the head of the Jesus Morning Star (JMS) religious group, who was indicted on charges of raping female followers through religious indoctrination.
The 11th Criminal Division of the Daejeon District Court, presided over by Chief Judge Park Woo-geun, sentenced Jung to 33 years in prison on the 19th on charges including quasi-rape. The court also ordered disclosure of his personal information, a 10-year ban on employment at institutions serving children, adolescents and people with disabilities, and 15 years of electronic monitoring. The case is separate from one in which the Supreme Court finalized a 17-year prison term against Jung for raping a Hong Kong national known as Maple and sexually assaulting an Australian national known as Amy and a Korean follower.
Jung was sent to trial on charges that between 2018 and 2022, at a retreat center in Wolmyeong-dong, Jinsan-myeon, Geumsan County, South Chungcheong Province, and other locations, he indoctrinated 16 female followers into believing he was the "Messiah," rendering them incapable of resistance, and then sexually assaulted or raped them. Jung had been released in February 2018 after completing a 10-year sentence finalized on charges including rape resulting in injury. After disclosures by Maple and others again brought to public attention that he had committed sex crimes against female followers, additional complaints followed and a separate trial proceeded.
After he was first indicted in this case in May 2024, additional cases were consolidated one after another, and the trial continued for more than two years before the first-instance ruling was delivered on this day.
Jung denied all the charges, saying he had never made physical contact with the female followers and that they had not been in a state of psychological incapacity to resist. But the court rejected his argument, saying, "All 16 victims testified in detail and consistently, to a degree difficult to describe without having directly experienced the locations where the crimes took place."
The court ruled that the victims "were in a state of psychological incapacity to resist, unable to make critical judgments, after being repeatedly taught to deify Jung and obey him absolutely." On sentencing, the court said he "held an absolute position as a cult leader and repeatedly molested multiple female followers by exploiting the hierarchical order," adding that "even after having been given a prison sentence previously, the crimes were committed repeatedly using the religious structure of control and influence he had built up over a long period."
The court stressed that "despite the gravity of the harm the victims suffered from the crimes, he denied the offenses by claiming the victims' testimony was false," and that "because there are more victims and more instances than in the earlier case, punishment more severe than the previous ruling is unavoidable."
Kim Ji-sun, 48, the second-in-command at JMS who was indicted alongside Jung on charges including quasi-rape for taking part in his sexual assault crimes, was sentenced to seven years in prison.
Kim, known as Jung's "successor," was indicted on charges of indoctrinating followers in 2018 into believing Jung was the Messiah and taking part in crimes in which Jung raped or sexually assaulted three female followers. Kim is also serving a seven-year sentence finalized in October 2024 for taking part in Jung's quasi-sexual assault offenses, including handing pajamas to Maple, the Hong Kong national, between March and April 2018 and instructing her to "sleep here and watch over the Lord." Three other JMS executives indicted on charges of aiding Jung's rapes or helping him commit sex crimes received a three-year prison term and suspended sentences, respectively.
They are accused of luring victims who were female JMS followers between 2018 and 2022 to allow Jung to commit sex crimes (aiding quasi-sexual assault) or of coercing sexual assault victims into writing statements to prevent them from filing complaints (joint coercion). One person indicted on the same charges was acquitted.