Recently, ex-VCHA‘S KG announced his departure from the group and legal action against JYP Entertainment.
The members of the VCHA are all American and otherwise Yes, United Stateswhich means the lawsuit was filed in America. As a result, the full legal document detailing KG’s complaint against the company is publicly available online.
The full legal document details everything JYP Entertainment allegedly subjected KG and the remaining VCHA members to during their time with the company and is broken down below.
Plan
The document claims that KG’s daily schedule began at 7am with three school hours. She returned to the JYP building by 10:30 am, where she worked long hours, sometimes even after 11 pm, even though JYP staff allegedly pressured her to stay until 1-2 am with promises of “disappointment” and “consequences” if he didn’t. .
The lawsuit includes a statement from KG saying the only free time members were given was during the hours they were supposed to be sleeping.
Contractual conditions and payments
The lawsuit alleges that JYP used complicated loopholes to avoid treating KG and other members as they should have been under California law, using their status as “interns” to create a legal gray area. It is also said that contracts, some even in Korean, were sometimes given to the group with little time to study them.
This gray area allowed JYP to default on payment agreements and KG was only paid $500 per week. The company revealed that it was recovering that amount, meaning KG was paying itself. Also recovered was the cost of the home, a $2.5 million home purchased by the company in which the group was forced to stay together, creating an “internship debt” of $500,000.
Although VCHA has done more performances, including opening for TWICEKG earned nothing and was told she owed $504,503 after net profits.
Diet and surveillance
The group was also forced to maintain an extreme level of thinness and was often fed only small salads. On multiple occasions, members were denied meals and staff were even instructed not to eat.
This continued in the residence where the group was staying, with surveillance cameras placed to monitor food consumption, which was not initially known to the group. JYP reportedly promised that there would be no cameras inside the group’s quarters.
The group was also asked to request days off in advance and to report to the company their location and who they were with, including their weekly Sunday “day off.”
Health problems
During a dance practice, KG was singled out and forced to perform a dance move hundreds of times and was denied water until she understood it correctly, which resulted in a ruptured shoulder tendon. Although she reported that the doctor ordered her to rest, she was still forced to work through the injury and received blows to her shoulder.
All members reportedly suffered multiple injuries during training, including sprained ankles. They were forced to continue dancing twelve hours a day, with staff not allowing members to take it easy even when required. At one point KG was also diagnosed with laryngitis, but was scolded for getting sick and told it was her responsibility not to get sick.
The circumstances the members were subjected to resulted in a lot of stress and mental anguish, with the lawsuit claiming one member began self-harming, while another fell into a “deep” eating disorder and attempted suicide by consuming pills. This last member was found by KG, who along with the others were instructed to lie about the reason for his disappearance.
Abuse
The document states that KG and members were often subjected to verbal abuse from members, designed to make them train harder. In one instance, a dance instructor berated KG in front of the entire group, causing one of the members to run from the room in tears.
JYP Entertainment has not released a statement on the status of VHCA.
