Illegal Gambling Operation Involving Minors and Linked to Drug and Prostitution Charges

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Two masterminds behind illegal overseas gambling sites were extradited to Korea today, July 4. The scale of the sites they operated, which even recruited middle and high school students for gambling activities, reached 5 trillion won.

Lee Hyun-jung reports.

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At Incheon International Airport this morning, two men in handcuffs were escorted by police.

They were the masterminds behind illegal gambling sites who had been staying abroad, and both were apprehended in the United Arab Emirates.

Suspect A is accused of operating a gambling site worth 4.8 trillion won, based in Southeast Asian countries since 2014, and evading 66 billion won in taxes.

Police plan to investigate suspect A not only for drug and prostitution charges but also for his potential connection to the death of a Korean national in Malaysia in 2018.

The other suspect, B, is accused of operating a gambling site worth 500 billion won since 2018.

In particular, they used domestic organizational members to lure middle and high school students and mobilize them for gambling operations. The crime of drawing teenagers into gambling has recently emerged as a serious social issue.

[SBS Drama Taxi Driver 3: (You won.) They set it up like a simple pastime game and made the kids bet money on it.]

This extradition was made possible through the active cooperation of the United Arab Emirates government.

[Kim Se-jun/Chief of Northeast Asia Cooperation Division, National Police Agency: This is the result of close cooperation between our police and the UAE authorities over the past two years. We plan to continue tracking down crimes that harm our citizens through international cooperation.]

The government established a special task force for transnational crime last year and is currently tracking Korean criminal suspects.

(Video Editing: So Ji-hye, Footage courtesy of the Special Task Force for Transnational Crime)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.