Jeju: police refer a middle-school student over secretly filming teachers and making sexual deepfake composites; teachers dispute victim count and legal aid

Seoul Shinmun (23 September 2026, Jeju correspondent) reported that a student at a Jeju middle school who secretly filmed teachers and made some of the footage into deepfake sexual composites had been investigated by police and sent to prosecutors: Jeju Dongbu Police Station said it had referred student A without detention on the 17th for violating the Sexual Violence Punishment Act (filming using cameras etc.). Police obtained the student's phone by voluntary submission from his guardians and carried out digital forensics, which confirmed footage related to some teachers and some sexual composites; A admitted the conduct. A police official told the paper that the phone did not need to be seized by force, that voluntary submission also counts as seizure, and that forensics secured the evidence on which the referral was based. The Jeju teachers' union questioned whether the full scope of harm had been confirmed, in particular because the victim teachers had themselves checked footage involving several students yet the case was being closed without a compulsory search; police replied that the forensics of the submitted phone secured the necessary evidence. Police did not disclose the number of victim teachers because they still teach at the school and disclosure could lead to secondary harm; an official said there are more victim teachers than the one first reported but the number is hard to give, and that some suggestive composites were found and material causing shame was included in the charges. On the earlier suggestion of student victims, police said that on checking there were no victims among the school's students and that they had communicated with the victim teachers through an education-office supervisor to prevent secondary harm. The union said the victim teachers, two months after the case came to light, were receiving hospital treatment and counselling while going to school daily; on the 14th they gave police victim statements without a lawyer and on the 17th attended the regional teachers' rights protection committee without help from the education office or the school safety mutual-aid association, and had written and filed the criminal complaint themselves; special leave is hard to use because substitute teachers cannot be found, so only three or four of 16 days had been taken, and on the day of police questioning they taught a compressed morning timetable first; the union objects that the mutual-aid association calculated legal fees at 3.3 million won for all victim teachers combined, payable after the case closes. A union official said teachers who suffered serious sexual offences were being questioned without lawyers and writing complaints themselves. Police said they had conveyed to the education office that the teachers' psychological suffering could be considerable and that support such as treatment costs, rest and sick leave was needed. The victim teachers' requests to meet the superintendent on the 1st and 3rd were not accepted; a third written request was sent to the superintendent's office on the 21st. The union is collecting signatures nationwide until 2 October for severe punishment and support, to be submitted to the prosecution and the Jeju education office. News1 (23 September) reported the police announcement of the referral on the same charge, adding that the student had been booked for filming a teacher's body with his phone during a school field trip around mid-July, that the phone examination showed the offending continued for several months with multiple victims, and that police found no indication the composites were distributed.

Update, 29-30 September 2026. On 29 September one of the victim teachers (unnamed) gave a press interview at the Jeju Teachers' Union office (Seoul Shinmun, News1, JoongAng, Segye, Jejusori, Halla Ilbo; the JoongAng, Segye and Insight texts and the Yonhap photo caption belong to the Yonhap chain). She said that early in the investigation she had seen on the student's phone not only footage of herself but material in which other teachers and current students appeared to be the subjects, and that she had written a separate list of the people and types of harm; at the police victim examination the amount of her own material shown to her was considerably less than what she had seen on the phone, and additional material of hers was confirmed only after she went through her list with the police. She said she was not alleging deliberate minimisation, but that identifying students, some filmed in civilian clothes on a field trip, needed an objective identification procedure; on checking with the school, investigators had asked the school only to identify the perpetrator and had not requested material to identify the students, after which the school sent parents a letter premised on there being no student victims. Segye and JoongAng quote her as saying the students she recognised on the phone numbered 10 to 20, and that a graduate had suffered much worse deepfakes, which she reported to that student's school as school violence; police told her the victim could not be identified. She also said police had first spoken only of illegal filming and found the deepfakes days later. Police told News1 that the investigation had been thorough, using phone forensics, that every act beyond social norms had been identified and proven, and that one student had been confirmed as a victim, a student attending a different school; JoongAng reports that this student's case was booked and investigated. The teachers were notified on 22 September that the case had gone from the police to the prosecution and on 24 September that it had been sent to the court's juvenile division as a juvenile protection case; the teacher said she had not been able to submit any of the material she had intended to give the police and would file a victim opinion and objective material separately. She said the original complaint had also asked for investigation of physical contact in 2025 as possible forcible molestation and of repeated approaching, waiting and watching in 2026 as possible stalking; Halla Ilbo reports that physical contact and stalking by the student are said to have continued since 2025 and quotes her saying she was frightened every morning because the student waited on the stairs she used to film her. Jejusori reports that the case came to light in July when, during a field trip to a cinema, a student was seen hovering around teachers and was caught on the spot. Yonhap-chain reports (Segye, JoongAng) describe the charged victims as five teachers. On legal aid, the teacher said she had wanted to appoint a lawyer suited to a juvenile-law case but no costs were supported, and that no education-office lawyer accompanied the teachers to the police examination or the protection committee. The education office briefed the same morning (Jejusori, Halla Ilbo, Seoul Shinmun): under the teachers' mutual-aid rules a teacher who is sued receives up to 6.6 million won per instance, while a teacher who files a criminal complaint receives 3.3 million won per case; office lawyers, as public-body staff, cannot act as an individual teacher's counsel at a police examination; the office said it had linked the teachers to the national Digital Sexual Crime Victim Support Center, announced an integrated support system run through a hotline and the teacher-activity protection centre, a forum on 15 October and a new protection officer post from 1 January, and its section head said the office was sorry and regretful that early support had not been felt. On 14 September (Newsjeju) the union had said the teachers attended the police victim examination without an office lawyer after the mutual-aid body set fees at 3.3 million won for all of them, that it had filed an objection on 3 September, and that two requests to meet the superintendent had gone unanswered; the provincial council's education committee questioned the office the same day and the education bureau chief said it would look at ways to stop victims having to cope alone. On 28 September (Seoul Shinmun) the KTU Jeju branch demanded rapid deletion and blocking of the material, monitoring through specialist bodies, legal, psychological and medical support, leave and substitute staff, real separation from the student, data protection and a response manual.

Lawyer-fee application rejected (6 October 2026). Seogwipo Broadcasting, a Jeju outlet, reported on 6 October, citing people in education and a tipster, that in a recently submitted written opinion on litigation-cost support the education authority had finally declined the victim teachers' application for lawyer fees for an additional criminal complaint in the case. According to the report, the authority, after hearing legal experts, said that with a police investigation already under way an additional complaint by the teachers could hardly be seen as an effective measure to stop or prevent the continuing infringement of their educational activity, and that the support requirements were therefore not met. The report says people in education object that victims' litigation costs were fully supported in earlier sexual-harassment and sexual-offence cases, including two incidents at an elementary school in Seogwipo, and quotes the tipster calling the rejection inequitable. The article body does not name the school, the region or which additional complaint the application concerned. This review links the report to this case by inference from the outlet's Jeju location, the case description and the legal-cost dispute recorded above.

Teachers were secretly filmed by a student and some footage was turned into sexual deepfake composites; two months on, per the union and the teachers' own account, the victim teachers are in hospital treatment and counselling while continuing to teach at the same school and handled the police statement, the protection committee and the criminal complaint without legal or institutional support. One teacher says she was afraid to go to school each morning because the student waited on the stairs to film her, and that physical contact and stalking date from 2025 (teacher's account). The filming and composites are admitted per police; the teachers' situation is the union's and the teachers' account.

Referred to prosecutors without detention on 17 September 2026 (Jeju Dongbu Police Station) for violation of the Act on Special Cases concerning the Punishment of Sexual Crimes (filming using a camera or similar device). According to the victim teachers (Seoul Shinmun, News1, JoongAng, Segye, Halla Ilbo, 29 September), they were notified on 22 September that the case had been sent to the prosecution and on 24 September that it had been referred to the court's juvenile division as a juvenile protection case (소년보호사건); the teachers say they had not yet submitted additional evidence or a victim opinion and intend to file them. The court is not named and no court record was read. Regional teachers' rights protection committee convened 17 September. The union's petition for severe punishment and victim support runs to 2 October 2026. Whether a separate charge covers the composites is not stated; police say material causing shame was included in the charged conduct and told News1 they found no indication the composites were distributed. Police say the student's phone was voluntarily submitted and forensically examined. Seogwipo Broadcasting reports that on or before 6 October 2026 the education authority rejected the teachers' application for lawyer fees for an additional criminal complaint.