Cult "Treatment" Leads to Loss of Addict's Leg

Most US rehab centers would advocate against duct-taping people to help them recover from drug addiction. Hinting at the reasons behind this policy, one man has had to have his right leg amputated above the knee as a result of this method. Queens resident Myung Ching has been arrested, along with her fiance Sung-Peel Youn, for stuffing a sock into the mouth of her drug-addicted, mentally ill brother Seungick, then binding his wrists, ankles and knees with duct tape in the basement of a Flushing, NY church. This was apparently ordered by Pastor Ok-Joo Shin, the leader of what Ching's family calls a Korean-American Christian cult. "The couple believed the pastor, who is a woman. They say she's God," says Youn’s sister, Sarah. “They made it so tight—and all the time they were praying and singing. They thought God would make him a regular person.” Two days later, Myung Ching noticed that her brother's foot was swollen. But it wasn only eight days after the "treatment" that she took him to a dermatologist—by which point his leg was purple, black and blue. The dermatologist ordered them to the emergency room, where amputation was deemed necessary. Ching and her fiance have since been charged with assault, reckless endangerment and unlawful imprisonment; they're being held on $150,000 bail.