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In the late fall, Jeon Se-hoon, 33, received a call at his office in Gaebongdong, western Seoul. “I think it’s him,” he responded after listen- ing to what the caller had to say. “Get a team together and chase after him.” Kim Sang-jeon, 46, the man who phoned Jeon, was heading to Busan when he was tipped off about the whereabouts of a man the two having been chasing for six years. They, along with more than three dozen others, are pursuing an extraordinary con artist by the name of Jo Hee-pal, who ex - tracted about 4 trillion won from more than 40,000 people in a pyramid scheme played out from 2004 to 2008. But Jeon and Kim aren’t police officers. Rather, they are both members of the Citi- zens’ Coalition for Respectable Household Economy, an informal and atypical entity or- ganized by those who suffered losses in Jo’s scam. Currently, about 40 of its members are working to track him down. Jeon became involved in the effort after his mother lost hundreds of millions of won in Jo’s pyramid scheme, and Kim, his colleague, heads the organization. “Pursuers range from those in their 20s to those in their 60s, some of whom are victims or the children of victims,” Kim said. “When we find Jo’s hidden assets, we report them to the prosecution or the police.” In July 2013, the Daegu District Prosecu - tors’ Office resumed its efforts to track down Jo’s hidden assets, which add up to 76 billion won, and authorities have so far rounded up six people believed to have a connection to the case. The renewed investigation, however, was prompted by a report from the coalition. CCRHE members always carry laptops so that they can hold video conferences at a moment’s notice. As soon as the members receive information, they immediately share it. The facts they acquire are then stored at the CCRHE headquarters. According to public information, Jo was born in 1957 to a poor family living in the small town of Yeongcheon, North Gyeong- sang. He moved to Daegu alone after finish- ing high school, hoping to earn enough to support his family. After making a living working as a day lab- orer during his teenage years, Jo worked at a betting house, where he hung out with mem- bers of Dongseongro-pa, the biggest gang in the region. Then he joined SMK, the coun- try’s first pyramid scheme company. As the con man became richer, he spent most of his time indulging in three person- al vices: women, golf and gambling. Other times, he bought drugs or luxury goods, in- cluding BMW sedans and Rolex watches. Those who lost their money lodged formal complaints, and his scheme was eventual- ly brought to light in October 2008. Jo and his aides are known to have bribed investi - gators to close the case, and one prosecutor was even questioned over suspicions that he took hundreds of millions of won from the swindler. But whether Jo is alive is part of an ongo- ing debate. The police announced that Jo died of cardiac arrest in December 2011, in a hotel in Weihai, China, and added that his body had been cremated and a gravesite set up near his home in North Gyeongsang. His remains, they said, were unidentifiable. Documentation is also unclear. A death cer - tificate reportedly verifies that the con man died, but because forgery prevails in China, his victims argue that it is likely a fake. Since then, some have claimed that they’ve seen Jo — once in Daegu, or at a coffee shop in Busan. One of Jo’s aides, who worked as his bodyguard in China, is also yet to return to Korea. ViCtims in pyramiD sCheme team up to traCK Down Con artist guesthouse fire LeaVes four DeaD , six inJureD A fire broke out at a guesthouse in Damyang County, South Jeolla, killing four people and injuring six, most of whom were current or former members of a uni- versity paragliding club on an overnight training camp. Of the four dead, three were male gradu- ates of Dongshin University in Naju, South Jeolla. The other was a female undergrad- uate. Song Hun-nam, 40, an ex-member of the club who was not at the scene of the acci- dent, said in a telephone interview that the three male graduates were a 40-year-old surnamed Ryu, a 35-year-old surnamed Song and a 29-year-old surnamed Jeong. The undergraduate was 19-year-old Ko Eun-bi, a freshman at Dongshin University. Choi Hong-yong, the 55-year-old owner of the guesthouse, and a 20-year-old guest who reportedly has no connection to the paragliding club, were two of the six people injured in the blaze. The fire service said that Choi is a law - maker representing Buk District in Gwang- ju, South Jeolla. The injured were treated for burns in hos- pitals in Gwangju. According to police, the blaze began in a detached wooden facility used exclusively for barbecues. It was located five meters away from the guesthouse’s main building. Twenty-six of the paragliders, including 13 Dongshin graduates who are former members of the club, returned from train- ing at Mount Wolbong and began their bar- becue at 7:20 p.m., according to the police. A while later, a fire started in one of the four grills inside the structure after a loud explosion was heard, police said, adding that this information is based on the testi - mony of witnesses at the scene. The initial cause of the fire has not yet been confirmed, officers said. An unidentified person poured water on the barbecue to extinguish the fire, which exacerbated the flames as they mixed with the oil that surrounded the inner grill, sparking another explosion and causing the flames to spread across the room. The fire service said that the thatched sil - ver-grass rooftop caught on fire due to the sparks from the second explosion. From there, the blaze transferred to the wall and finally to the floor. All 26 of the people inside the structure, including 21 of the club members and five others, were soon reportedly surrounded by flames and tried to escape through the single entrance. One survivor said that a fire extinguisher was nowhere to be found at the scene of the accident, and that the one discovered at a nearby location “malfunctioned in less than a single minute.”