I hid the fact until the last moment. The club, which believed in him until the end, ended up being hit in the back of the head.
It was 2023, which was greeted with extraordinary 스포츠토토determination. Active investment by the parent company was made. A total of 3 free agents were recruited to fill the vulnerability and set fire to the hearts of the fans. He also signed a large-scale contract extension that guarantees the native ace until after enlistment.
The visual identity (VI), such as the logo, was also changed. Literally, it was a change that promoted a new 40 years by removing the stigma of ‘a team that did not win the Korean Series for 30 years, once in fall baseball for 10 years’.
From its grand beginnings it has been crooked. On the 23rd, just 9 days before the opening, the fact that Seo Jun-won (23), a promising 5-year-old prospect who has been cherished, was found guilty. He is accused of making a body picture of a minor he met online and sending it to him.
The incident took place in August of last year, the police investigation began in earnest in December of last year, and the arrest warrant was reviewed on the 21st through a prosecutor’s request for a warrant.
Although he is still young, he is the father of a son who made a 100-year promise early on. He cannot escape moral condemnation apart from future judicial proceedings. The same goes for a professional baseball player who wants to give ‘dreams and hopes to children’
The presence of an attorney is essential for this procedure. If the suspect does not use a lawyer, a public defender is attached. Seo Jun-won did not reveal this fact to anyone. He responded by hiring a personal lawyer himself. After the agent was contacted by the lawyer, the club only found out after Seo Jun-won, who attended the disciplinary committee, admitted this fact.
In the meantime, the Lotte team did their best to unlock Seo Jun-won’s potential. He was also sent to Geelong Korea last winter. In the spring camp, in addition to pitching coach Bae Young-soo, training coach Kim Hyeon-wook stuck with him and taught him. He was included in the season plan as a long-man and first-choice pitcher, and he pitched three times in demonstration games.
It is possible to hold responsibility for ‘negligence in management’, but considering the strengthened Personal Information Protection Act, it is not a reasonable point. Seo Jun-won repeatedly lied to the club’s repeated inquiries from outsiders.
The club put Seo Jun-won as a protected player in all three free agents. Given his talent as a prospect, it’s a natural choice. If Seo Jun-won had talked about it in advance, the list of protected players would have been different. The long-term plan itself, which has been waiting for this year, has been twisted. This is why Lotte decided to withdraw from the group, which is the highest level of discipline, regardless of whether the prosecution is indicted or not.
Seo Jun-won, who was originally accused of kidnapping minors, was later changed to a violation of the Child and Youth Protection Act (production and distribution of sexually exploited materials) through additional investigations. Permanent disqualification by the KBO is likely.
The remaining legal issues are 1. Whether Seo Jun-won recognized that the other party was a minor 2. Whether the act of sending the body photo was done with mutual consent or whether there was a request or coercion from Seo Jun-won in the process 3. Seo Jun-won induced or 4. Whether or not the photos in question were leaked or distributed to a third party, etc. remain.
Seo Jun-won, who contacted his headquarters, expressed despair at his position that had changed overnight. He regretted not quickly seeking help from those around him. He repeatedly said, “I have nothing to say. I’m sorry.”
However, Seo Jun-won insisted, “I didn’t know that (the other person) was a minor. It was the first time I learned about it during a police investigation. We had never met. We only talked through an anonymous chat.” It remains only for the future judgment of the court. It is a gateway that individual Seo Jun-won, not a professional baseball player, has to overcome.