By Park Si-soo
Staff Reporter

A police announcement on the investigation into the suicide of actress Jang Ja-yeon in March has raised more questions than answers.

Police booked nine people out of the 20 questioned but failed to identify who the late actress was forced to provide entertainment and sexual intercourse to.

None of the corporate figures and media executives suspected of having sex with the late Jang have been booked. Police said they were unable to find concrete evidence to the claim that the late actress was forced to provide sex in completing their investigation Friday.

The probe started weeks ago following the publication of a suicide note that said she was unable to overcome the stress of her entertainment agency forcing her to have sex with various public figures.

``Based on her note, we've looked into hundreds of documents and CCTV records we confiscated from her manager and agency president. More than 140,000 phone calls between Jang and her associates have been scrutinized as well,'' Han Poong-hyun, head of the Bundang Police Station, said.

``The nine figures booked were confirmed to have deeply been involved in the incident.''

Jang hanged herself at her house in Bundang, south of Seoul, on March 7. A few days later, her agent disclosed a seven-page suicide note, supposedly written by Jang, which stated that a former agent had forced her to provide sex and entertainment to several VIPs, including CEOs of two print and online media organizations, program directors and a bank CEO. The other bigwigs allegedly include owners and presidents of chaebol.

The nine include three entertainment agency officials, two movie directors, three bankers and a businessman. Among them are Yoo Jang-ho ㅡ Jang's most-recent manager, who disclosed the letter ㅡ and Kim Sung-hoon ㅡ her former agency president, who allegedly pressured the 29-year-old to provide sex and abused her.

They were charged with defamation, coercion and assault against the actress, the officer said. Kim is now in Japan, defying repeated requests to return to Seoul for questioning.

Many suspect police succumbed to pressure from the VIPs.

Police initially vowed to investigate all listed figures, but after two months, they were nowhere close to taking legal action against them as none of them were summoned for questioning.

In 2002, a similar scandal involving famous entertainment directors and singers and actresses occurred but no legal action was taken.

pss@koreatimes.co.kr