Why is former EXO member Kris Wu sentenced to 13 years of imprisonment? Charges explained

On Friday, November 24, the media outlet, China CCTV, announced that the former EXO member, Kris Wu, was sentenced to thirteen years of imprisonment on charges of alleged s*xual assault. Back in 2021, following a Chinese netizen, Du Meizhu's accusations of idol grooming women and s*xually engaging with underage women, Kris Wu was arrested by the police, and the investigations for the same kickstarted.

In July of this year, the idol appealed a private appeal to the Beijing Court after he was found guilty of r*ping three women between November and December of 2020. However, the results concluded that the idol would continue to be sentenced to thirteen years of imprisonment, which was previously declared in a court hearing in November 2022.

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Everything that went down with the former EXO member Kris Wu, leading up to his thirteen years of prison sentence

On July 8, 2021. a Chinese netizen, Du Meizhu, posted a series of Instagram stories exposing screenshots of text messages accusing Kris Wu of r*pe, s*xual assault, solicitation, and grooming. The accusations also further expanded that the idol seduced many women into sleeping with him in exchange for job opportunities or threatening them to interact with him s*xually and also allegedly engaged with underaged women.

While the idol's agency denied these allegations, Du Meizhu once again exposed the idol after releasing proof of the agency sending her money in return for her retracting her statement about Kris Wu. Soon after the allegations, the idol started to lose his brand deals and partnerships, and several other netizens opened up about their experience with the idol, affirmatively standing with Du Meizhu.

Moreover, images, videos, and any content related to the idol were removed from Chinese social media platforms like Weibo, iQIYI Video, Tencent, Baidu, QQ Music, etc. By the end of July 2021, the idol was arrested by the Beijing police and was held in detainment for investigation of the landed allegations. However, given that the idol could be detained, it proved to many that there were close pieces of evidence pointing at Kris Wu's lack of innocence in the issue.

The police investigations not only confirmed that Du Meizhu's allegations of her being s*xually harassed by the idol were true. Additionally, given that several other women came forward expressing themselves as a victim at the hands of the idol, the allegations started to get legitimized, and severe police investigations were begun.

By November 2022, Kris Wu was deported to the Beijing Chaoyang District People's Court after being proven guilty of r*ping three women between November and December 2020. This naturally resulted in the idol's thirteen years of imprisonment. However, the idol privately appealed to the Beijing court against his r*pe conviction in July of this year.

Following another set of trials and investigations, the Beijing Third Intermediate People's Court, an appellate court, dismissed his appeal and reinstated his original sentence of thirteen years of imprisonment. The Beijing court also ordered the idol to be deported from China at the end of his sentence.

According to the Korean news outlet Star News, here's what the Beijing court put forth about Kris Wu's imprisonment,

"Wu Yifan (Kris Wu's real name) took advantage of the drunken state of many of the victims to commit rape and gathered people together to engage in lewd activities. The facts recognized by the original trial decision are clear, and the evidence is also solid."

Since Chinese law follows a two-trial system, the idol's thirteen years of imprisonment have been confirmed. The long-running controversy over the idol's allegations has seen a conclusive end.