A South Korean cloning company said yesterday it had no plans to screen its future customers, despite a scandal involving a US client accused of abducting a man decades ago.
Ra Jeong-chan, the head of Seoul-based RNL Bio, said he was unaware of the criminal records of Bernann McKinney, accused of kidnapping a Mormon missionary in England, handcuffing him to a bed and making him her sex slave.
Bernann McKinney gained widespread prominence recently when she had RNL clone five pups from her beloved pit bull, Booger. The firm claims that the puppies, for which McKinney paid US$50,000, represent the first successful commercial cloning of a canine.
But the intense media coverage of the event also helped expose the 31-year-old mystery.
After initial denials, Bernann McKinney admitted to reporters on Saturday that she was Joyce McKinney, who became a British tabloid sensation in 1977 when she faced charges of unlawful imprisonment in the missionary case. She jumped bail and was never brought to justice.
The revelation, however, drew little reaction in South Korea, where newspapers and television broadcasters are focusing on the country’s medal tally in the Beijing Olympics.
Ra said that even if he had known about McKinney’s record, that would not have affected his decision to clone her pet.
“There was no reason to check her background,” when she made a cloning request, Ra said, describing the matter as “a privacy issue.”
He also said that criminal records will not disqualify future customers, saying that the cloned animals could even help them find stability and thus prevent crimes.
South Korea’s welfare ministry also said it has no plans on mandating cloning firms to conduct any background checks of cloning clients.
Lee Byeong-chun, who helped the RNL in cloning the five dogs, was not immediately available for comment. Lee’s team of scientists at Seoul National University created the world’s first cloned dog, a male Afghan hound named Snuppy, in 2005.
Lee’s team has since cloned some 30 dogs and five wolves.
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