Korean Shaman Found Not Guilty of Frauding Woman of $499,000
What I learned from this article is that if you commit fraud under a religious pretext it is perfectly legal. By the way who knew being a shaman could be so lucrative?:
A shaman who was taken to court on charges of fraud was ruled not guilty by the Seoul Southern District Court on Wednesday.
“Shamanism is, for the most part, aimed at gaining consolation and inner peace. Even if shamanistic rituals do not yield the promised outcome, it is difficult to hold the shaman accountable for the failure,” the court said.
The shaman in the case had blamed the spirits of the victim’s aborted twin babies for her husband’s flagging business and suggested the victim appease the spirit babies through special rituals.
The prosecution accused the shaman of fraud for carrying out an excessive number of rituals and charging over 560 million won ($499,000). The shaman provided 133 rituals in the period between January 2011 and December 2015. During the time, she sent mobile text messages to the alleged victim using baby talk as if she was possessed with the twins’ spirits.
The text messages read, “I know how you feel mommy. Please don’t feel sad. We love you,” “We ate loads of the meat you sent us. We love it very much.” [Korea Herald]
You can read more at the link.
Chuckle you may but $500k is nothing compared to the billions that have been thrown at the Clintons. No shortage of fools in the world.
Very off-topic, but the Clinton foundation gets quite a respectable score for transparency and effectiveness. https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=16680
Trump Foundation, a little harder to gauge, apparently: https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=16764
Shamanesses in Korea have always made pretty good money. The belief in Shamanism waxes and wanes, but was actively sort of suppressed under Park Jeonghui. The Det I was on (Hill 675-Kamaksan) was surrounded by destroyed shamanist shrines, but Park Jeonghui was not cold in his grave before people started coming back and restoring them. It’s considered one of the so-called 명산 for shamanism, and just across the DMZ in Kaesong there’s an even more auspicious mountain.
I had always nursed the suspicion that shamans were filling a need for counseling and psychology practice. Back in the day there were not too many openly practicing mental health professionals in Korea, but there were all sorts of fortune tellers, name-givers, other occult people hanging out shingles and enjoying a thriving practice.
A full-blown ritual to address some serious family matter was expensive. 133 of them would add up. But in this case, the shaman was clearly manipulating and up-selling the client.
What is remarkable is that shamanism still has many adherents among practicing evangelical Christians in Korea. Sort of like Voodoo and Santeria in Latin America.
“The shaman in the case had blamed the spirits of the victim’s aborted twin babies for her husband’s flagging business”
That was my first thought, as well. Now, I am leaning more towards financial mismanagement.