My Calling Is Profiler [EN]: Chapter 387

“Then?”

“It’s highly likely there are people we don’t know about involved here.”

Park Do-joon spoke quietly, looking at the map on the wall.

“But how do we pinpoint them within all this? Just looking at it, there seem to be at least a thousand bars.”

That was by no means a small number. But that didn’t mean Park Do-joon was without a plan.

“That’s true. Should we investigate the hostess bars after all?”

Lee Ji-soo also tilted her head, as if she was out of ideas. But Park Do-joon didn’t think raiding hostess bars would be effective. If the perpetrators were the kind of guys who could be caught that easily, they wouldn’t have been struggling like this.

“Raiding hostess bars probably won’t make much of a difference.”

“Why is that?”

“What are you going to charge them with? Prostitution?”

“Of course, that’s the obvious charge, right?”

“Yeah, of course. But you know, surprisingly, prostitution rarely happens on-site.”

“Pardon?”

“Usually, it happens after moving to another location.”

Lee Ji-soo hadn’t experienced such crackdowns, so she didn’t know the exact process or typical cases.

“Bars are just places to drink, literally.”

It wasn’t a joke; it was the truth. Bars primarily sell alcohol. Really. So, even if the police raid them, there’s often nothing concrete to find.

“What do you mean by that?”

“The businesses involved are separate.”

For example, let’s say there’s a bar called A. It’s legally registered as an entertainment establishment, and it’s not illegal to hire female staff and sell alcohol there.

So, the police step in to crack down on it? When they go inside, they’ll only find a normal business operating legally.

Morally, it might not be a great place, but legally, it’s operating within the bounds of the law, so you can’t nitpick and hold onto that as a problem.

“Prostitution mostly happens in other third-party locations. That’s where the problem arises.”

You have to crack down on those places, but there are three main problems. First, you don’t know where they are. Second, the owner of the place has no apparent connection to the bar, so realistically, it’s unlikely a warrant will be issued. Third, those places anticipate crackdowns and have tight security.

“You’ve never been involved in a prostitution crackdown, have you?”

“No, I haven’t.”

A profiler would never be involved in a prostitution crackdown. That’s why Lee Ji-soo doesn’t know the process well.

“There are three problems with prostitution crackdowns.”

First, corrupt police officers leak information from the inside. Because of that, more than 70% of crackdowns fail.

Second, the closed door. When the authorities come to crack down, if the owner senses something is wrong, they simply lock the door. Of course, if a search warrant has been issued, it’s not a problem. You can just break it down.

The problem is that the door isn’t made of glass or anything like that. Of course, you can’t just hammer it open. It’s 100% a steel door, so the only way to open it is to drill a hole and use a hydraulic spreader [a tool used to pry things apart].

In the past, it was possible to force it open with a crowbar, but nowadays, there are preventive measures that make it impossible to open with a crowbar. Naturally, instead of quickly opening it with a crowbar like in the past, you have to create a gap with a crowbar and forcibly open it with a hydraulic device, which takes at least 10 minutes, no matter how skilled you are.

“And let’s say you get into the bar. Can you prosecute them then?”

“Ah, I see.”

Legally, to prosecute for prostitution, you have to catch evidence on-site. You have to take photos on-site, or seize items that can prove sexual relations, or at least find testimonies from the surroundings.

“Oh? Is that so?”

Yoon Tae-min approached, seemingly curious about Park Do-joon’s words. Well, it would be an unknown world to him.

“That’s why prostitution crackdowns are so difficult.”

Park Do-joon shook his head. When these kinds of issues arise, women’s rights groups get furious and attack, but the reason why crackdowns can’t be done isn’t just because the police are incompetent, but because there are practical limitations to the methods for conducting crackdowns.

In reality, the moment they get caught in a crackdown, quick-witted people immediately call a lawyer, and due to the limitations of the Special Act on Prostitution [a South Korean law], which states that they can’t be punished without testimony, the police immediately back off when the lawyer’s name comes up.

Even if they catch prostitution offenders in a crackdown, the percentage of those who admit they engaged in prostitution is only about 10%.

“Can’t you do something legally?”

“It’s impossible. To do that, you’d have to deny the right to private property from the start. And even if you deny property rights, how are you going to open the door? By opening it and going in? Are you going to torture them?”

You have to deny that to open the door and enter without a warrant. Most information leaks occur during the process of requesting a warrant.

So, let’s say you solved that. Regardless of whether you have a warrant or not, you need a process to open the door to enter the bar. Why do those bars have no windows? Just to make you lose track of time? No. It’s to prevent you from breaking in through the windows.

“What, should we mobilize heavy equipment to get in? And then torture them to get them to confess to prostitution?”

Three minutes is enough to erase evidence, and that three minutes can be bought even without the door, just by mobilizing the staff.

Even if you’re with a woman inside, an adult entertainment establishment is a business that can legally have female staff, so that’s not illegal.

“Furthermore, all three of those things violate the constitution, wouldn’t you say?”

Of course, it’s currently impossible to apply that.

“We can’t just deny the constitution because women’s groups are whining, can we?”

If we did, there would really be a riot. At this point, you might as well consider them not a women’s group, but the ruling class of the country.

“Hmm, so there’s no way for us to solve that?”

“That’s not true.”

Park Do-joon turned his gaze and looked at an empty space on the map.

“From the start, what we’re trying to catch isn’t prostitution.”

“Pardon?”

“Ah, that’s right. It’s a complete trap.”

“……?”

Lee Ji-soo seemed to understand Park Do-joon’s words right away, but Yoon Tae-min tilted his head.

“This is a rescue operation.”

“A rescue operation?”

Yoon Tae-min tilted his head, as it was a completely unexpected statement. He had heard that he was supposed to find the bars related to this case. But suddenly, a rescue operation?

“Criminals move to maximize their profits. And the women who have been smuggled into the country will have debts.”

“Debts?”

“Yes, the cost of smuggling isn’t cheap.”

Does it really cost only about 3 million won [~2,200 USD] to be smuggled from China to Korea? It can’t be. Generally, it costs at least 20 million won [~15,000 USD], and up to 30 million won [~22,000 USD].

“That’s definitely not a small amount of money in China.”

But despite that, smuggling continues to be attempted. Because if you work hard in Korea, it’s money you can earn in a year, and the money you earn after paying off that debt is by no means small.

“The average salary for a college graduate in China is 800,000 won [~600 USD]. The problem is that this is a lot from the perspective of the Chinese.”

There aren’t as many universities as in Korea, and the labor market is so large in comparison, so college graduates receive quite high salaries.

“You can think of most workers as earning about 500,000 won [~370 USD].”

500,000 won a month. Korea’s minimum wage is over 2 million won [~1,500 USD], so there’s a difference of four times. If you earn for one year in Korea, you earn as much as you would in four years in China.

“Especially in bars, it’s even more so.”

Due to the nature of prostitution businesses, even if the money spent on smuggling is 30 million won, there will be people who pay it off in as little as three months.

If you earn 10 million won [~7,500 USD] a month, even if you only earn 500,000 won a day, you can earn enough while taking holidays.

“But what does that have to do with this case?”

“Do you think criminals will let them go just because they’ve paid off their debts?”

“……?”

“Criminals don’t have any regard for the human rights of their victims. It often comes out in the news.”

“I only studied…….”

‘I figured.’

Park Do-joon looked at Yoon Tae-min and clicked his tongue. Then he said quietly.

“You saw the profiling in the report, right?”

“Yes.”

“The police think the criminal group took the money.”

That’s natural. In fact, it’s possible to spread rumors among the Chinese people that ‘the police embezzled the money,’ but the Chinese government isn’t stupid enough to believe such words, not to mention the Chinese government itself.

However, the Chinese government just wants to pressure Korea on this occasion.

“So?”

“Do you think those guys will let go of the women who have paid off all their debts like that?”

Of course, they’ll forcibly hold onto them. And they’ll forcibly make them engage in prostitution in their bars.

In reality, there are quite a few criminal organizations that do that. Even to Koreans, that’s what criminal organizations do, so what kind of treatment will they give to women who have been smuggled into the country and are now impossible to track?

“Even people who have officially received labor permits and entered the country are treated that way, so what about women who have been smuggled in?”

‘Moreover, looking at this situation, it seems like when it’s time to discard them, they send them to sadomasochists as a kind of disposal.’

“Um…….”

Yoon Tae-min frowned at those words. And he was a smart person, so he immediately realized.

“They’ll keep them locked up.”

“That’s right.”

They’ll keep them locked up and forcibly make them engage in prostitution, sucking up all that money. In reality, there are quite a few criminal organizations like that. Even Koreans are subjected to that by criminal organizations, so what kind of treatment will they give to women who have been smuggled in and are now impossible to track?

“So, cracking down on this place isn’t a bar crackdown, but a rescue operation. And to carry out such a rescue operation, the help of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is absolutely necessary.”

“Pardon?”

Yoon Tae-min looked at Park Do-joon in bewilderment at those words. Park Do-joon looked at such Yoon Tae-min with a smile.

‘There’s no law that says only you can use us. Let’s use you a little too.’

Of course, we don’t have to use them. But considering Yoon Tae-min’s purpose for being here, he has no choice but to help.

“I heard the Chinese government is putting pressure on you?”

“That’s right.”

“So, request a joint investigation from the Chinese government. Even if you don’t officially send public security officials, ask the embassy to send people. Well, there are plenty of excuses, aren’t there? You need an interpreter, or something.”

“Why bother?”

Humans want to hide their flaws. And that goes for groups as well. In fact, if you’re going to carry out a rescue operation, you don’t necessarily need the help of the Chinese embassy.

It’s not like there aren’t people who get paid to interpret, so you can just hire them.

“I know. But this is how you get out of this situation.”

“What do you mean?”

“The embassy needs achievements. No matter how much they have anti-Korean sentiments, they won’t be able to refuse. The moment they refuse, it won’t be an achievement, but a weakness.”

It’s the mission of most countries to protect their own citizens. But if the Korean government officially requests them to protect their own citizens and they say, ‘No, I don’t want to?’ would that really not be a problem?

“Even if the Chinese media keeps quiet, the Korean media will gleefully chew on it.”

Of course, then the Chinese government can’t pressure the Korean government. Because they refused to help when they said they would.

“Oh?”

Yoon Tae-min couldn’t help but make a strange noise at those words. It was because he had come because of the pressure from above anyway.