Source: Yonhap News
The prosecution report has revealed that entire lineups of X1, Wanna One, and IZ*ONE were rigged.
According to the official complaint filed by the prosecution on the 5th, Kim Yongbum, who is in charge of producing the series, manipulated the number of rank A trainee votes in the online and live character voting results of 'PD 101' 2nd season in 2017. The prosecution found that one trainee was pushed out of the 11th place through manipulation and excluded from making his debut with the top 11. A member from B rank was then included in the debut group after voting data reviewed. The members who made their debut through this voting operation became members of "Wanna One" and worked for about one year and six months.
Ahn Jun Young, who was in charge of producing the program, was found to have changed the pass and dropouts by manipulating the rankings at the time of the 2nd dropout decision. Ahn PD was found to have altered rankings randomly by changing the vote results during the first dropout decision in Season 1.
CP (Chief Producer) Kim and Ahn PD's voting operations became bold in the third and fourth seasons. According to prosecution, they had already set the 12 trainees that would make their debut before the broadcast. Then they manipulated the voting results by multiplying the sum of the votes by the number of trainees according to the ranks and then multiplying the result by the sum of the votes.
In the fourth season thereafter, the same method was used to manipulate the rankings of the 11 final debut groups.
Allegations that the production crew received favors from entertainment agencies were also captured. Ahn PD reportedly received a total of 47,030,000 won worth of alcoholic beverages from 47 people at entertainment venues in Gangnam, Seoul from January last year to July this year. The prosecution reported that the agency officials provided these favors so that their trainees would receive benefits and favorable edits in the program.
- [+4,229, -868] All the produced groups got so successful and the brand value got so great that the PD and the planners saw all that money and got greedy...as a result all the trainees ended up as victims..it's too bad...I wish they done things differently.
- [+2,100, -73] Make sure to punish them severely so that no more trainees will suffer
- [+2,240, -399] Who the hell is the last member that the changed the final Wanna One lineup??...I know you got billions of won in settlement.
- [+1,714, -102] I hope all the adults that took advantage of these trainees will be punished severely so that the damage to the victims will be minimal. The trainees that got dropped need to be compensated too.
- [+1,519, -81] Mnet and CJ need to take responsibility for the damage to the poor trainees
- [+554, -68] It's all because the PDs got greedy. The trainees just went along with the game. Mnet needs to make amends to all the trainees and the poor kids that were dropped from debut.
- [+457, -18] Superstar K was no different. They said there was no revival for the loser but Jung Joon Young who got second place got to return anyway. The result? sexual assault.
- [+477, -51] Wanna One got paid over one billion won per person.. isn't this embezzlement? They completely changed the course of a kids life...they need to pay compensation.
- [+437, -22] In the end, the sweat and dreams of these poor trainees were trampled on by the production crew and their agencies...I feel sorry.
- [+396, -6] How many hours did those poor kids have to struggle only for the PD's to manipulate the final rankings? Isn't that abuse?...I hope the get multiple prison sentences.
- [+418, -74] Was I the only one shocked when Kim Jong hyun didn't make it on Season 2?
- [+241, -16] CJ better reward him with the same amount Wanna One received as settlement ㅋㅋ
- [+213, -2] Give back the money we paid for the character text votes...if they took 100 won per person it means they extorted hundreds of millions from viewers.
