Dog trainer Kang Hyung-wook addresses accusations in 55-minute video

Television

Published: 26 May. 2024, 14:15 Updated: 27 May. 2024, 10:50

Dog trainer Kang Hyung-wook addresses accusations in 55-minute video

Star dog trainer Kang Hyung-wook, right, and his wife Susan Elder deny recent accusations mainly centering around their workplace behavior in a video posted on their YouTube channel BodeumTV on Friday. [SCREEN CAPTURE/JOONGANG ILBO]

Celebrity dog trainer Kang Hyung-wook, 38, fended off accusations including spying on his employees and reading their private messages in a 55-minute YouTube video posted Friday.

Kang headed a now-closed dog training company, Bodeum, with his wife, Susan Elder, 39, in Gyeonggi. Issues about his workplace behavior arose after one or more alleged previous employees of Bodeum posted on a recruitment platform last week.

Kang foremost addressed the allegation that he and his wife were spying on the employees through the security cameras. "We need those cameras to prevent theft or entry of an unauthorized outsider. I recall one or two employees particularly being paranoid about the cameras."

The two also denied installing security cameras inside female changing rooms, saying "that room is a meeting room, not a changing room," and added, "We are not in a profession where we need to change clothes [midday]."

To the accusations of reading employees' private messages among each other, Elder said that she "belatedly realized that Naver Works [the messenger program] allowed me to read the contents of the employees' messages" and initially "didn't want to read them because it felt like spying," but when she saw her six-month-old son's name, she "flipped out."

"There were messages that said we were making money off our son by going on 'The Return of Superman' [celebrity kid show]," she said. "I confirmed that four employees at the time were having these kinds of conversations, and even though I am at fault for looking at those messages, I felt the need to address it, and talked to them a few days after."

Kang added that he did not make the employees sign an agreement acknowledging that the couple could spy on their online conversations. Instead, the agreement "asked employees not to have personal conversations on the messenger since the program has a surveillance function."

To the allegation that he gave employees spam inside a doggy poop bag, Kang said that it was a "kind of a funny happening," at least for him.

"We placed a wrong order of spam, and none of it came in the nice boxes. I asked for the employees' understanding and asked that they just divide it among themselves," Kang said.

"Some of those people, I think I remember, took the meat cans home in the poopy bags."

Kang was also accused of neglecting his now-passed-away dog, Leo, following another online post that said they allegedly saw the dog on the company's rooftop in hot summer weather, covered in its own excrement.

"Leo was very sick and couldn't move his hind legs at all," Kang said, explaining that the dog had no control of its bowels. "I brought him to work because I wanted to spend all my free time with him."

Kang in the video also denied treating his employees with violent hostility and not paying them properly.

"I ask that you please stop bashing workplace where great employees and great trainers worked," he said. "We will take legal action against anyone making false statements.”

The couple further addressed the allegation that Elder was part of a religious cult. The rumor was prompted by an article published Saturday by local news outlet Dispatch.

"My wife was a second-generation member of the Unification Church," Kang told Dispatch. "It was against her will. She became part of that religion because of her parents."

According to Kang, Elder left the Unification Church when she turned 20, and has since quit ties with her father.

"He didn't even come to our wedding," he said.

Kang gained popularity after appearing on the dog training entertainment program “There is No Bad Dog in the World,” which began airing in 2015 on EBS.

BY LEE JIAN [lee.jian@joongang.co.kr]