Actor Kim Soo-hyun was cleared of allegations of dating a minor and also won a lawsuit seeking return of contract payments with an advertiser.
On the 27th, the 13th Civil Division of the Seoul Eastern District Court dismissed the plaintiff's claim in the suit filed by Mido against Kim Soo-hyun's agency Gold Medalist seeking return of a contract payment in the 570 million won range.
Earlier, Mido had signed an advertising model contract with Kim Soo-hyun in 2020 and had continued renewing the contract, maintaining the relationship. Accordingly, in November 2024 it paid a contract fee of 900 million won and extended the contract for one year, but when allegations emerged that Kim Soo-hyun had dated the late actress Kim Sae-ron since her minor years, it filed for contract termination and sought return of the contract payment. Its argument is that because the contract was terminated due to the model's fault, the contract fee corresponding to the remaining contract period must be returned.
On the other hand, Gold Medalist rebutted that the controversy was a fabricated false exposure by a third party and argued that Kim Soo-hyun bore no responsibility. Meanwhile, the court ruled that "the grounds for contract termination do not exist," and reportedly dismissed Mido's claim.
In particular, besides Mido, some companies that had advertising contracts with Kim Soo-hyun have filed lawsuits seeking return of model fees and damages against Kim Soo-hyun and his agency Gold Medalist. Kim Soo-hyun has been sued for damages in the hundreds of millions of won by brands including Eider, Cuckoo Electronics and Cuckoo-affiliated companies, Trendmaker, FromBio, and others, and the total amount of lawsuits is reported to be about 10 billion won.
This is the first time a court decision has been issued among the brands that sued Kim Soo-hyun. Having made the first a victory, expectations are growing that future trials will also yield positive results.
Regarding this, Bang Sung-hoon of law firm Pyeongsan, legal representative for Kim Soo-hyun, told OSEN, "This is the first time a judgment has been rendered among the brands that filed suits against Kim Soo-hyun. Trials for suits filed by other brands are also underway, and no sentencing dates have been set yet," and added, "Ultimately the most crucial part is whether there is fault on (Kim Soo-hyun's) part or not, and the investigation results showed that he was a victim of a third party who even manipulated evidence to spread false information, and that the perpetrator is now detained and on trial, isn't that what was revealed. While advertisers also suffered damage as a result, the court's ruling means that those damages are not to be claimed from an innocent model."
He continued, "Although the contract terms differ slightly among advertisers so some claims vary a bit, they are similar overall. Since our first claim was dismissed, we hope other cases can be concluded with similar results," he said, offering a cautious view.
Meanwhile, Kim Soo-hyun suffered a setback in his activities in March last year when allegations arose that he had dated the late actress Kim Sae-ron since her minor years. At the time, Kim Soo-hyun's side acknowledged the relationship with the late Kim Sae-ron but rebutted that the meetings continued after she became an adult. Accordingly, Kim Soo-hyun's side filed a complaint for defamation by false statements in a timely manner against the late Kim Sae-ron's bereaved family members who raised the allegations, and in May the agency stated that "the deceased's KakaoTalk conversations were found to have been forged and altered from conversations with persons unrelated to Kim Soo-hyun, and the deceased's voice was also confirmed to be manipulated material generated using AI technology," expressing their position.
Subsequently, the person who initially raised the allegations of dating a minor was arrested and prosecuted on charges including violation of the Act on Promotion of Information and Communications Network Utilization and Information Protection (defamation by disseminating false information), violation of the Act on the Punishment of Stalking Crimes, violation of the Act on Special Cases Concerning the Punishment of Sexual Crimes (distributing recordings using cameras and coercing use of recordings), and threats. Having been cleared of the accusation after about a year, Kim Soo-hyun resumed activities last month, starting with an advertising shoot for the Philippine fashion brand "Bench" and restarting his social media activity.
[photo] OSEN DB
[OSEN]