On the 27th (KST), Riot Korea has made an announcement with regards to the Griffin incident. In the announcement, it explained the reasoning behind former director of Griffin, Cho Gyu-nam,  Kanavi’s granted FA status, and that Griffin’s management, Still8, must step down and provide a new management for Griffin, and that they must settle all their shares they hold over Still8 and Griffin. Furthermore, Riot has also announced their plans to prevent such incidents from happening again.

First they’ve explained that the ruling on Cho is the highest form of penalty, based on the GPI (Global Penalty Index), and that it applies to players, coaches, and even directors in the League. This ruling prevents an individual from taking part of Riot-affiliated esports events, and it prevents Cho from being a part of any organization in the league, not even as a shareholder. They’ve also further stated that they will be investigating on the matter of coercion and blackmail against Kanavi this week.

They’ve also announced that Kanavi will be granted a Free Agent status. They’ve stated that the reason why Kanavi becoming FA took so long is because they had to be thorough in figuring out the complexity of the loan-transfer status, and domestic-international laws. 

Riot further stated that at the time of announcing Griffin’s competitive ruling, which was a fine of ~$83,000 USD, they weren’t aware of the ‘slave contract’ with Kanavi. With Still8 coming forward by admitting their role in creating such a contract, Riot stated that they believe the responsibility falls on the shoulders of Still8’s management, thus demanding every single member of the Still8 management to be replaced before the end of 2019, and that the current management must sell all their shares by the day before the LCK Summer Promotional tournament in 2020.

Finally, Riot has announced their plans in preventing such an incident from ever occurring again, and the following is the translation of their plans moving forward.

1. Investigating all player contracts before Spring 2020, and preparing standard contract forms by the first half of 2020.

We will be investigating all the contracts of players that are playing in the LCK and Challengers Korea. We’ll also be closely reviewing all the future contracts of players in the LCK and Challengers Korea.

If there’s any problems in this review process, we’ll be demanding changes to problematic clauses, and will be issuing rulings if deemed serious. We will finish this investigation before the start of 2020 LCK Spring, and will also make announcements, when deemed necessary.

Finally, we’ll be analyzing different problems that may occur in the investigation process, and will create the ‘LCK standard contract forms’ by the first half of 2020, to be utilized by many. We’ll keep you updated with regards to this matter.

2. Follow-up measures for securing fairness and protecting players’ rights.

Through this incident, we’ve realized that there’s a limit to the trust in the operation committee’s investigation. To secure fairness and protect players’ rights, we’ll be taking the following measures.

• A separate committee that operates independently from the Operation committee
• A system that allows appeal, summoning, and re-investigation on a ruling.
• A system where players may freely file a complaint for any unfair contracting or mistreatment.
• A legal review system that protects the players’ rights.
• Figuring out the current state of the trainees and providing solutions.
• Educating the pro teams to prevent all verbal and physical violence.

We’ll make sure to take all these measures as soon as possible, and we’ll make an announcement when we’ve gotten results.