What Was the 'Gift Certificate Broker's' Role? Unanswered Questions Remain

[Anchor]

However, even with today's police announcement on the 14th, many questions surrounding this case remain unanswered. In particular, attention is focused on whether the gift certificate broker, who introduced the victim to the suspect surnamed Shin and drove her to Paju, had prior knowledge of the crime, and if so, to what extent they assisted.

Continuing with the report from reporter Je Hui-won.

[Reporter]

Police have uncovered circumstances indicating that Shin, a cafe owner in Paju, attempted a gift certificate transaction back in July as well.

However, the deal fell through as no buyer appeared, and police explained that on August 7th, Shin was introduced to a gift certificate broker, A, by a third party.

Police investigation results revealed that during the gift certificate transaction process, Shin deceived others by pretending there was a "virtual seller" while acting as an agent himself.

It was also found that the day before the crime, Shin lied to broker A, telling them, "The gift certificate seller I recruited wants a woman as the transaction counterpart."

Police are also investigating the prospective buyer who attempted to purchase the forged gift certificates worth tens of billions of won involved in this case to see if there was actual intent and funds to buy.

Police believe that the female victim, who had no prior acquaintance with Shin, was not clearly aware of what role she was supposed to play on the day of the incident.

It was confirmed that before and after the crime, Shin had video calls with broker A using the victim's mobile phone from locations such as a refrigerated warehouse, and the exact purpose of these calls is another point that needs to be further uncovered.

The 500,000-won forged department store gift certificates commissioned for printing by Shin bore the small-font text "For Filming," but police explained that it was difficult to spot the forgery at a glance as it was covered by a paper band.

Police have booked broker A on charges related to the forgery of securities, namely gift certificate forgery, and are intensively interrogating whether A knew about the gift certificate forgery beforehand.

(Video Editing: Lee Sang-min, Design: Lee Jun-ho, Kim Ye-ji)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.