’Organized crime ring members control college council’

Members of an organized crime ring have taken the helm the student council of a university for the past eight years, police said Wednesday.

They used part of fees collected from students to operate the council as fund for their crime ring, a spokesman said.

The chief of the group and his cronies worked as chairman of the students’ body one after another, he said.

The Gwangyang Police Station in South Jeolla Province said it arrested nine member of the “Lions” group on charges of violence and organizing a crime ring. They spent about 370 million won from the student council’s coffer for their group.

The group’s head, 44, who was identified only by his surname Joo, served as chairman of the students’ organization in 2004.

After graduating from the university in Gwangyang, he exerted influence-peddling to make his cronies chairman of the students’ body, the spokesman said.