James Leigh, a businessman said to have global contacts in the intelligence community, tells Newsmax that he traveled to North Korea at the invitation of one of North Korea’s military leaders to attend its Military Foundation Day on April 25. But when Leigh arrived at the airport in Pyongyang on April 22, he was searched, detained, and interrogated for several days, before finally being allowed to continue his journey.
While imprisoned, Leigh says he spoke through paper-thin walls to another detainee who was being beaten and interrogated in an adjoining room. That prisoner identified himself as Prof. Tony Kim.
The North Korean government confirmed on Wednesday that Prof. Kim has been arrested and charged with “acts of hostility” and trying to undermine Kim Jong Un’s Hermit Kingdom. He was a visiting professor of accounting at North Korea’s University of Science and Technology. According to Leigh, Prof. Kim told him that many other foreign nationals have been secretly arrested and imprisoned in North Korea.
Prof. Kim told Leigh an associate had visited the facility where the prisoners are housed. According to Prof. Kim’s account as related by Leigh, locals refer to that prison as “the house of people with no name” or “the place without a name” — Leigh was uncertain of the precise phrase due to language difficulties.
“He was pretty specific about that,” says Leigh. “He knew about that. That was something he really wanted me to know. … There were Americans and Europeans. … He was pretty specific because that was probably where he was going.”
During his interrogation, Leigh says, he saw large filing cabinets stuffed with thick files bearing Western-sounding names. One name he specifically recalls seeing was “Brian.” Another name was French or Italian. But he says he cannot be certain whether those files represented Westerners secretly consigned to the North Korean equivalent of a Soviet-era “gulag archipelago.”
According to Leigh, Prof. Kim said he wanted to leave North Korea because he was suffering undue criticism from his boss. The teacher was reportedly arrested at the airport along with his wife, although she was later released and has returned to the United States.
Two other Americans are currently known to be imprisoned in North Korea. In March, the North Koreans sentenced a 21-year-old University of Virginia student, Otto F. Warmbier, to 15 years of hard labor for taking a propaganda poster down off the wall of a hotel. Another prisoner, businessman Kim Dong Chul, a former Virginia resident, was arrested in October 2015 and is being held on suspicion of espionage.
The account Leigh received from Prof. Kim, if substantiated, would indicate that North Korea has pursued a more widespread, systematic practice of imprisoning Westerners.
“He says there a lot more Americans than we know about being held,” says Leigh, who adds that given the thousands of U.S. ex-pats living in Asia and the limited resources available to track their whereabouts when they go missing, he does not find Prof. Kim’s claim farfetched or improbable.
In response to Prof. Kim’s arrest, former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton told Fox News on Wednesday: “For far too long, North Korea has taken Americans hostage to use as bargaining chips. The Trump Administration is the right time to put a stop to this once and for all.”
Leigh says Prof. Kim’s interrogation reflected an odd fixation on U.S. President Donald J. Trump.
“They were saying to him ‘Who sent you, did Donald Trump’s team sent you? Did the pig Donald Trump [send you].’
“They were calling Donald Trump ‘the pig Donald Trump’ and ‘the war-crazy Donald Trump’ and ‘the killer-of-innocent-people Donald Trump.’ They didn’t say America. They kept saying Donald Trump. Which I thought was odd. I thought they’d go, ‘Well, the Americans … but they kept saying, ‘Were you sent by the pig Donald Trump?'”
In his account to Newsmax, Leigh described hour upon hour of prisoner abuse occurring in the room next door.
“One time, I heard a piece of wood break,” he recounts. “Whether it was a piece of wood or a cane they were using, I heard it break. And I heard thuds that sounded like a body falling on the floor. So he was being beat up, lightly, I don’t think hard, but he was being slapped around and hit. You’ve got to imagine, this was going on for a day, 24 hours at least.”
In between the beatings, the two prisoners spoke. He said Prof. Kim, a South Korean, told him he had agreed to teach in the North against his family’s wishes because he hoped the exchange of ideas would help contribute to mutual understanding.
“He took it because it’s a job,” Leigh said, “but also he felt he could do something special and make a difference.”
Leigh says after he was released officials took him to his hotel, where he continued to be under rather obvious surveillance for the remainder of his trip. He did attend the military parade, and was seated among other foreign nationals in a section about 50 yards from dictator Kim Jong Un.
One observer seated next to him, a Russian, told Leigh that foreigners are always seated near the strongman, to protect him from a surprise missile or drone attack due to the risk of collateral casualties.
“He was stocky,” Leigh says of Kim, “and he also wasn’t free and relaxed. He was very stiff, almost marching, very tense. He was just in and out, like he didn’t want to be there.”
He says during the parade he saw “some interesting looking missiles.”
“They would have been medium range missiles most likely, judging from the length of them,” he says. “I’m not an expert on missiles, but they would have been intermediate range, the type they would use on Japan or South Korea, but not the type that would be American bound.”
Leigh reports seeing several indications that North Korea is now in a state of high military alert: Soldiers toting rifles, military vehicles rushing through the streets, and men walking about carrying what he understood to be military equipment contained in government-issue duffel bags.
“Their people are aware now that there’s a chance of war. You can see it in their faces… There’s a lot of military movement, it’s like an ant hill going on.”
Leigh says loudspeakers in North Korea continually spout messages like: “Prepare to honor your country and your leader, and never be afraid if you’re right.”
He said during his two-and-a-half day imprisonment, Prof. Kim told him, “There’s a lot more Americans locked up here than anyone knows.
“I said, ‘Are you serious?'”
“He said, ‘Yeah, Canadians, Americans, Europeans. There’s a whole place to hold them.'”
Leigh credits Prof. Kim’s whispered advice from the other side of the paper-thin wall for his eventual release. His fellow prisoner told him that under no circumstances could he respond with anger toward his interrogators, but to never agree to any accusations of espionage no matter how exhausted he might become.
Leigh says Prof. Kim speculated the foreign nationals would be used as leverage in case the regime comes under attack, but that the instructor didn’t know whether the victims had been arrested or kidnapped.
Leigh, who was permitted to leave the country on the 27th, calls his captivity “a near-death experience” that has scarred him for life. The hardest part, he says, was knowing that he had to leave Prof. Kim behind.
“You know, there was nothing I could do,” he said, growing emotional. “I knew there was nothing I could do. Had I tried to interfere, it probably would have changed the direction I was going. I thought to myself, ‘the most valuable thing I can do is get out of here and tell this story.'”
He says Prof. Kim’s last words to him were “Stay quiet, keep your head down, and get the hell out of here.”
Reported By Andrew Kerr | 
Bryan Fischer Host of “Focal Point” 
Alex Pfeiffer | Reporter | 8:22 PM 05/04/2017
Ryan Mauro is
What Did You Say? 
This week, we are adding 19 convictions, including cases from Texas, Colorado, and Illinois. These are just the latest convictions. Yet despite the overwhelming evidence, the left prefers to bury its head in the sand and refuses to acknowledge the reality of Voter fraud.
Take one example from Kansas. When Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach claimed his first conviction in a voter fraud case against a non-U.S. citizen, opponents of the conviction had no interest in dealing with the facts.
Instead, some groups on the left—like the liberal news site Think Progress—accused Kobach of “voter suppression.” Another Salon article completely dismissed Kobach without addressing the evidence he found, saying, “Someday he’ll have evidence of a problem that doesn’t exist.”
In many states, voter registration requires proof of citizenship. The left calls such policies anti-American. But is that really such a radical idea, that voters in a U.S. election would have to be U.S. citizens?
If liberals want evidence, then Heritage has it. To date, we have documented 773 confirmed criminal convictions in 492 voter fraud cases spanning 44 states.
Here are a few of the newest entries to the database:
After a two-year investigation into local voting fraud, hidden camera footage surfaced revealing a uniformed and on-the-job Olvera “negotiating an exchange of money for mail-in voter lists.” Olvera is scheduled to be sentenced on May 25.
The crime is a Class 3 felony. Kidd was sentenced to 12 days in the St. Clair County Jail and is now barred from engaging in campaign-related activities or electioneering.
Clearly, absentee voting remains particularly vulnerable to fraud.
Simply put, in most states there are few measures in place to sufficiently verify the identity of those casting absentee ballots. Signatures can be forged—a problem that can be addressed by requiring the voter to include a photocopied valid ID along with the absentee ballot.
But more robust identification requirements would only solve part of the problem. They cannot defend against the pernicious targeting of absentee voters by pressuring, coercing, or “assisting” them in filling out their ballots in order to assure that particular candidates or causes prevail.
So long as states continue to allow the names of deceased voters and residents who have moved away to remain on their voter rolls, they are leaving the door wide open to fraudsters who are willing to take advantage of the system by voting in their names.
The Heritage Foundation published “Does Your Vote Count?,” a guide to help voters and policymakers understand the issue of election fraud. That report provides policy recommendations that states should adopt to help thwart illegal activity and ensure that the election process remains free and fair for all.
Procedures that can be implemented include requiring a photographic, government-issued ID and proof of citizenship to register to vote. In addition, participating in an interstate voter registration crosscheck program will help guarantee that people are not voting twice.
Secretaries of state should verify voter registration data with other state and federal agencies, such as the state Department of Motor Vehicles and the Social Security Administration. Such measures will offer a barrier of protection not only to eligible voters, but also to the electoral process in general.
A single fraudulent vote does more than just cancel out the vote of another American. It puts a stain on the results of the entire election. If voters are discouraged to participate in what they perceive as a tainted process, it only empowers those who would seek to steal elections.
Instead of vilifying those who fulfill their duties to protect the electoral process, the left should embrace the facts. Voter fraud is real, and we must take seriously the task of securing the integrity of our elections.
Commentary By
Jason Snead/ @jasonwsnead
Jason Snead is a policy analyst in The Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies. Read his research.
Robert Ordway
Robert Ordway is a member of the Young Leader’s Program at The Heritage Foundation.