An alleged bullying victim of Kim Garam (LE SSERAFIM) comes forward, says she just wanted an apology but company dismissed her – Asian Junkie

LE SSERAFIM member Kim Garam has been under siege by controversy since she was announced as a member of the group with a lot of testimony about her behavior ranging in severity. Until now though, there have been no bullying victims that came forward to share their story, but one recently stepped forward, identified as Yoo Eunseo (an alias).

Indeed the accuser talks about the school violence document being passed around and how she had to transfer as a result.

1. The authenticity of the notice of the results from the School Violence Countermeasures Committee
The notice of the results of the School Violence Countermeasures Committee, which there was controversy over its authenticity, is consistent with the results submitted by our client, which shows the seal of the head of Gyeongin Middle School.

The details of her story then follow.

On June 4, 2018, the School Violence Countermeasures Committee was held and Kim Garam, a student who had committed school violence, was punished with six hours of special education pursuant to Article 17-1-5 of the Act on the Prevention and Countermeasure of School Violence. Her parents received five hours of special education in accordance with paragraph nine of the same article. Yoo Eunseo, a victim of school violence, received psychological counseling and advice in accordance with Article 16-1-1 of the same act. The victim Yoo Eunseo voluntarily transferred because she could not withstand the continued bullying but she suffered from malicious rumors such as ‘Yoo Eunseo was in the wrong, that’s why she was forced to transfer.’

Yoo Eunseo is also allegedly not only a victim of school violence but also getting roped into this against her will. She never said anything, however.

Then four years later, Kim Garram was revealed as a member of LE SSERAFIM in April 2022 and friends who knew about the incident contacted Yoo Eunseo and expressed their anger, saying ‘how can the perpetrator of school violence become a celebrity?’ Due to the constant media attention, Kim Garam was in the eyes of the media, which stressed out Yoo Eunseo.

She went on to describe how her situation became worse when HYBE released their refutations to the allegations, with many harassing her and threatening her.

Then a post on Nate Pann exposing Kim Garam was made, and the content noted that Kim Garam was well known for her poor attitude that those in the surrounding schools also knew, and if there was a student she didn’t like, she would gather other students to pick on and curse at that student together. The individual who made the post was also a victim of school bullying, that’s what the post meant. Including the post mentioned just now, several posts have been uploaded pointing out Kim Garam as a perpetrator of school violence. Perhaps it’s because Yoo Eunseo was a victim at the hands of Kim Garam, that there was a comment made that it was Yoo Eunseo who made the post exposing Kim Garam as the perpetrator, but Yoo Eunseo was receiving messages through her social media accounts saying that she is maliciously slandering Kim Garam or that she is an orc who was just jealous of pretty girls. More comments such as ‘everything [on her face] was redone, but she’s still ugly,’ ‘she’s slandering cause she’s jealous,’ were also received. But worse, some messages and posts even shared photos of Yoo Eunseo, blurring her out and threating her with the message ‘thanks for taking care of the mosaic. If you stalk LE SSERAFIM, you better get your grave ready. Yoo Eunseo suffered extreme anxiety and fear at the thought that someone may have the original photo and that someone, whether it’s a blackmailer or another person making threats, would disseminate it through the internet to anyone, anywhere, at any time. She even suffered from panic attacks from time to time, where it was difficult for her to breath because she felt like her heart was about to burst.

Yoo Eunseo’s request to the company was that they retract their statement and apologize, but HYBE dismissed this and continued on. Due to the abuse, she says she intended to drop out of school and tried to take her own life.

The victim did not ask for any compensation, but she urged for the deletion of the statement that was different from the truth, to make a statement based on the facts, an apology, and simply just the truth. But HYBE did not reply to the certified mail, and Kim Garam’s entertainment activities are proceeding as if nothing has happened. Yoo Eunseo, who could not endure the extreme anxiety and fear caused by the second round of attacks made towards her, eventually attempted suicide. This led to her and her parents deciding for Yoo Eunseo to stop her studies and expressed their intention to have her drop out from school. Currently, she is being treated at a psychiatrist without attending school for the past seven weeks before finalizing the withdrawal process. Her mother has stopped all of her personal activities to take care of her and to prevent her from attempting to take her life again.

They reiterate again that the reason they decided to file a lawsuit is not compensation, but closure, and HYBE has ignored them to this point as the abuse stemming from this is only escalating on the alleged victim.

The lawyer concludes by saying that they have refrained from sharing the details in hope of a solution, but if they do not change their stance then they will disclose what happened in the special investigation.

In this statement, detailed descriptions of the school violence that Kim Garam committed against Yoo Eunseo were omitted in hopes of an amicable resolution to the problem. HYBE did not provide a genuine apology to the victim, instead saying that the allegations are slander and Kim Garam is the victim. If HYBE continues to maintain this position, we are considering releasing the full report from the School Violence Countermeasures Committee, including the summary of the case, as well as the victim statements given during the investigations as well as descriptions of the heinous abuse that was not included. Furthermore, we will release the curse-filled, threatening text messages that the abuser had sent to the victim to lure her to where the abuse took place.

That last part in particular doesn’t seem good. Until now there’s been a lot of unverified information with regards to the bullying and school violence, but if the alleged victim is willing to expose that the records of Kim Garam bullying are real and is willing to make the results public, then that’s a significant step in terms of credibility.

Either way, I hope HYBE knows what they’re doing because this issue is not simply going away and is in fact escalating, while their stance of trying to ignore it until court or whatever is only letting others control the narrative surrounding this.