Family Forum / Parenting / Adoption / November 2004

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Mother Is Club Hostess Who Became Tycoon's Mistress

LOS ANGELES (Nov. 28) - The illegitimate son of a wealthy South Korean
industrialist has filed a federal lawsuit claiming he was denied an inheritance
after being given up for adoption in California 18 years ago.

Peter Roach, 26, sued his father's company, five half-siblings and others
alleging fraud, negligence and emotional distress. He is seeking $5 million,
the Los Angeles Times reported in Sunday's editions.

Roach is the son of now-deceased industrialist Won Man Lee, founder of Kolon
Industries Inc., and club hostess Mee Yeon Lee, whom he met in 1977 and took as
a mistress for several years, the newspaper reported.

Kolon, a synthetic fibers and engineering plastics manufacturer, has annual
sales of more than $1 billion.

Roach claims that after Lee suffered a stroke in 1985, he was left at an
adoption agency by an assistant who gave him the impression he was being sent
to the United States to attend school.

"I started panicking," Roach recalled.

A year later, an American couple adopted Roach and raised him in Rancho
Cucamonga.

After Lee died in 1994, Roach's adopted parents were given $100,000 for Roach's
expenses on the condition they sign an agreement releasing Lee's heirs from any
further financial obligations.

Roach later found the agreement, which had the businessman's signature on it.

Roach said he tried to contact his birth family through the company and the
adoption agency but met resistance. Frustrated, he hired two attorneys.

Lawyers for Kolon and Lee's relatives deny the family participated in a scheme
to send Roach to the United States, the newspaper reported. They also say the
case should be heard in Korea and that Roach asserted his inheritance claim
after the statute of limitations expired.

In June, Roach's lawyers added Holt International Children's Services in Oregon
and Holt Children's Services in Korea to the lawsuit, alleging they knew Roach
was cheated out of his inheritance and failed to act.

The March 2003 suit was filed in U.S. District Court. No trial date has been
set.

Kathy