What a mess.
I thought they had to be pretty confident in her innocence to go this far to protect someone who hadn't even debuted. Maybe they were too prideful to make her apologize and taint their reputation and thought they could sweep it under the rug, but it made things worse and will now taint it even more. Maybe they didn't do due diligence and concluded she was actually innocent. Either way, it has been extremely bad for their PR.
I honestly don't understand why would they go this far. While I'm not supportive of the idea that what she did when she has 12 should haunt her for her entire life, if I was a company with millions on the line I wouldn't have taken the risk. The group could've debuted as 5 and nobody would've missed her. If she was irreplaceable, make her apologize and "repent" in the dungeon for a year.
Now they're tripling down on the "wait until the end of the litigation". Even if they win the litigation, if they don't prove she's completely innocent, her reputation has been forever ruined. I don't believe she's innocent anymore, but I believe it may have not been as severe as the opposing law firm is saying. That's what lawyers do. They could've deescalated it at the start with an apology, but they decided to take a firm stance and now we are where we are.