Seungri to be moved to civilian prison after SC rejects his plea to reduce 18-month sentence

Seungri was accused of engaging in habitual gambling and arranging prostitution for investors from different countries

UPDATED MAY 26, 2022

Seungri was initially charged with 3 years in prison for a total of 9 charges but had his sentence reduced to half (YG Entertainment, Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images)

The entire K-pop world was shattered when it was revealed that Seungri (aka Lee Seung-hyun), a former member of the boy group BIGBANG, was involved in the controversial, ‘Burning Sun Scandal’. The scandal was one of the biggest Entertainment Industry-related scandals in the country. After years of back and forth, the former K-pop idol, who was enlisted in the military, was sentenced to three years in prison by the military court for nine charges in total including prostitution and habitual gambling.

As soon as the sentence was announced, Seungri appealed for a reduction in his jail time meanwhile the prosecution on his case, just like the general public, felt that the initial three-year sentence in itself was too low for the crimes he committed. After much deliberation, Seungri’s three-year sentence was reduced to a year and six months in prison. As he served his time in the military prison (Armed Forces Prison) to be incarcerated in a civil prison after he completed his military service, Seungri filed another appeal. This time, Seungri plead to the Supreme Court to have his prison sentence further reduced that the 18-month sentence that he received.

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Seungri was initially supposed to be charged with five years in prison which was eventually reduced to 1.5 years after deliberation (Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images)

Seungri’s plea to further reduce his sentence rejected

On May 26, it was reported that the first division of the Supreme Court had confirmed Seungri’s guilt and rejected his plea to reduce the sentence for another time. As a result of this, Seungri will be moved to a civilian prison where he will serve one year and six months. It was initially revealed that Seungri had his initial three-year sentence reduced to half because of his repentance and reflection on his past actions. The former K-pop idol had enlisted in the military ahead of his trial and was supposed to be discharged in September of 2021.

With his case being reopened when he was serving as a military soldier, Seungri was held in the Wartime Prison as a soldier. Now, the singer will have to be transferred to a civilian prison until he completes the remaining nine months of his sentence until February 2023.

Seungri was held on charges of habitual gambling and violation of the Prostitution Punishment Act (prostitution, prostitution brokerage, spy camera use, etc.) and embezzlement under the Act on Aggravated Punishment of Specific Economic Crimes. It was upheld in the lower court ruling that Seungri was guilty of all nine charges that were held against him. He was accused of engaging in habitual gambling from 2013 to 2017 in various casinos in Las Vegas, USA, while also being accused of arranging prostitution on several occasions for investors from Taiwan, Japan, and Hong Kong to attract investment from clubs and financial investment businesses and was also accused of engaging in prostitution and spread of spy cam sex footage and embezzlement of huge sums of funds under the Burning Sun scandal of 2016.