South Korean comedian Lee Jin-ho confesses to illegal gambling ...

South Korean comedian Lee Jin-ho admitted to illegal gambling on Monday (Oct 14). In a statement on his Instagram page, the 38-year-old said he wanted to "confess [his] shameful past which stemmed from [his] poor judgement".

He wrote: "In 2020, I started playing games on an illegal internet gambling site and ended up taking on debt that was difficult to handle."

After "coming to [his] senses" and "getting harsh advice" from his acquaintances, Lee managed to give up gambling. However, by then, he had already accrued "financial help from many people".

"I am steadily repaying the money every month, and I plan to repay this debt in full until I die. The financial loss is significant but more than anything, I feel very sorry to the people who trusted me and lent me money," he added.

Lee ended his letter by emphasising that he would repay his remaining debt and cooperate with the police in the investigations.

According to South Korean media outlets, Lee had borrowed 1 billion won (US$733,000) from celebrities and 1.3 billion won from a loan shark. Some of the celebrities he had borrowed from include BTS member Jimin, comedian Lee Soo-geun and singer Young Tak.

Following Lee's confession, the production team of the variety show Knowing Bros (of which he was a cast member) announced that they would be dropping him from the show.

Lee is also slated to appear in the upcoming Netflix variety series Comedy Revenge. However, Netflix has since announced they would not be able to edit Lee's sections out of the show due to its format.

"Since the programme is structured as a team battle, there are structural limitations to completely editing a specific team, which makes the story structure unstable. We ask for your understanding."