Good tee times kept disappearing — why a federal indictment may have the answers
Torrey Pines Golf Program File photo courtesy of The Lodge at Torrey Pines If you play the Torrey Pines or Balboa Park golf courses you re maybe aware of how formidable it is to get a good tee time especially for slots on Thursday through Sunday from the early morning to noon It s a common challenge across municipal courses in Southern California and a new federal indictment provides insight into the disappearance of weekend morning tee times within seconds of being published The attainable reveal to the mystery of the vanishing tee times can be revealed in a grand jury document filed this month in Los Angeles alleging that two men started a brokering business using digital devices to reserve thousands of tee times for resale at numerous golf courses nationwide In doing so they allegedly created a monopoly of Los Angeles and Orange County area golf discipline tee times by securing the most of sought-after early morning slots often within seconds of their release to the residents Golfers and industry experts had suspected bots were the culprit but that wasn t the situation None of the targeted Southern California courses are named in the indictment but Ciaran McEvoy of the U S Attorney s Office in Los Angeles approved for Times of San Diego that one of them was Torrey Pines Golf Discipline With majority of the action focused on courses in Los Angeles and Orange counties it s still not clear how tee times at Balboa have been snapped up While the indictment notes that the practice often violated municipal regulations it doesn t involve federal law So why the federal indictment In this situation the IRS opted for the Al Capone strategy accusing the twin brothers who allegedly ran the operation of evading income taxes Se Youn Kim aka Steve Kim and Hee Youn Kim aka Ted Kim were indicted not for the core operation in question creating a system to scoop up tee times but what they allegedly did not do pay million in income taxes Instead of paying the taxes the governing body says that Steve Kim spent his money on personal financial investments and luxury retail purchases including from brands such as Chanel and Louis Vuitton Brother Ted says the IRS spent his money on a timeshare in Hawaii luxury vehicles and luxury retail purchases including brands such as Cartier and Prada As numerous golfers who tried to get tee times at Torrey Pines could attest defendants made it more complex and more expensive for members of the society to reserve tee times at these courses without paying the defendants an additional booking fee the indictment noted Golfers reportedly paid the Kims using Venmo and Zelle accounts The establishment says that the two men who had worked as MRI technicians began the scheme around at the height of the COVID- pandemic According to the golfing industry this was the time the sport experienced explosive upsurge as people looked for safe outdoor programs amid lockdowns The defendants allegedly marketed their venture and communicated with their golfing clients through social media platforms and KaKao Talk a free instant message application widely used in Korea and elsewhere There are no further details about the digital devices the men may have employed to pull off the scheme or if bots capable of grabbing hours of tee times in less than a minute were part of the plan
