Father jailed for beating son for not picking winning horses through prayer

Seo frequently locked his son in his “prayer room” and made him pray 14 hours a day to predict winners. / Courtesy of Twitter

By Lee Han-soo

A man who assaulted his teenage son for years for not predicting the winners of horse races has been jailed.

The father, surnamed Seo, was sentenced to four years and six months in prison and to 80 hours in an anti-child abuse program.

According to the Jeju District Court on Monday, Seo had previously been jailed for child abuse.

In prison, Seo devoted himself to various religions and started believing that people could predict the future by meditating.

Seo was released in 2008 and started regularly assaulting his wife to predict through prayer the winners of horse races.

When his wife ran away in 2011 because of the constant violence, Seo turned to his 13-year-old son.

Seo frequently locked his son in his “prayer room” and made him pray 14 hours a day to predict winners.

He also beat his son with a wooden sword if he did not follow orders.

Seo’s reign of terror only ended when his daughter ran away to escape constant abuse.

Even then Seo tried to conceal his crimes by threatening his son, making him send a text message to his sister to change her story.

“It is clear that Seo committed unspeakable acts to his children in an inhumane way,” the court said in a ruling statement. “His children will have to live with both physical and mental trauma that is beyond comprehension.”