Daegu’s police force is focused on whether or not central Daegu police chief Seo Sang-Hoon will participate in his fellow police academy classmates-turned police chiefs’ battle against the sex industry.

The reason for this is that even though it is inside the central Daegu jurisdiction, for several decades now a notorious red light district called ‘Jagalmadang’ has been maintaining existence.

According to police, Seoul Dongdaemun police chief Lee Joong-gu declared a crackdown on an area of Jangan-dong where prostitution businesses were concentrated, and Daejeon central police chief Hwang Oon-Ha has come forth with a battle against an area of sex industry concentration in Yoocheon-dong.

The prediction among Daegu area police is that chief Seo will form a ‘Three-Top’ with chiefs Lee and Hwang’s “Two-Top’ to stand up against the sex industry.

Since an action team, excluding the central Daegu police office, was formed by the regional police office to more efficiently control the situation, there is a sense of a concrete plan to face the battle against Jagalmadang.

As for the Jagalmadang, Daegu’s representative avenue of corruption, presently there are 44 businesses in operation. The police are estimating that there are 130 females working in the sex industry there.

However, the overriding analysis is that it will be difficult for chief Seo to take on the role of ‘Three-top’, because the large scale of operations like that in Jangan-dong in Seoul, where there are 70 businesses employing 20-40 female sex workers each while start-up expenses alone require an investment of 1 billion won, or Daejeon’s Yoocheon-dong, where there are 68 prostitution businesses open, cannot be compared to Daegu’s smaller Jagalmadang district.

The Daegu regional police office, through a coalition of each and every police station, are beginning to concentrate on managing the sex industry from July 16th until October 16th.

Daegu regional police section captain for underage prostitution, Ryu Kyeong-Hee, said “Director Eo Cheong-Su did not speak directly about the ‘nationwide expansion of sex industry regulation’ that was mentioned in the press” and “Because every year the sex industry has been controlled, this year too, the level of control is progressing as usual.”

A central Daegu police official clarified by saying, “The result of regular crackdowns every year, Jagalmadang’s recognition is diminishing” and “We have to go out and start to clamp down in a balanced manner on these sex acts and new species of degenerate businesses that are spreading like poisonous mushrooms.”

Source:Daegu Shinmun
Translated by Chris Buchman