Singer jailed 1 year, actor's son given suspended term for cannabis
The Seongnam Branch of the Suwon District Court sentenced singer Choi Daniel, 21, to one year in prison and a 7.16 million won forfeiture for buying, brokering and smoking cannabis, and jailed him in the courtroom. Actor Cha Seung-won's son Cha Noah, 24, was given six months suspended for two years for smoking cannabis two or three times.
🇰🇷 Suwon District Court Seongnam Branch, Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province · South Korea
The Seongnam Branch of the Suwon District Court sentenced singer Choi Daniel,
21, to one year in prison for buying, brokering and smoking cannabis and took
him into custody in the courtroom.[1]The court also ordered him to forfeit
7.16 million won (7,160,000), the amount stated in its sentence.[1]
The court said selling and brokering cannabis required a strong penalty to stop
the drug spreading and to stop more people taking it up.[1]It said it chose a
prison term because he had taken the trial seriously and repented, and it took
his circumstances into account in sentencing.[1]Choi was accused of receiving
cannabis from an English instructor and others on 16 occasions between August
2012 and February 2013 and passing it to broadcaster Bianca Mobley and others,
and of smoking it several times.[1]
Actor Cha Seung-won’s son Cha Noah, 24, a former professional gamer, was
sentenced to six months in prison suspended for two years for cannabis smoking.[1]The Suwon District Court’s Seongnam Branch criminal division 1, headed by
judge Ham Seok-cheon, issued the sentences at a hearing on the morning of 17
October 2013.[2]The court gave no separate explanation of its reasons for
Cha’s sentence.[2]Cha had been indicted without detention, and the trial
court noted that his offence was a smaller number of smoking occasions than
those of the others tried with him.[2]Prosecutors had sought ten months in
prison for Cha at the closing hearing, and his family submitted a petition for
leniency before it.[2]
Cha Noah was also indicted without detention on cannabis-smoking charges in
March, alongside broadcaster Bianca Mobley and Choi Daniel.[3]The court said
Cha and the other smokers’ offences could not be considered light, but it was
sparing them punishment this time in view of their deep reflection.[3]
Photos and video
Page picture for the sentencing report, uncredited and without a caption; it is not established to show the courtroom or the defendants.Photo details
JTBC gives no prison term or sentence type for Cha Noah, saying only that he received a suspended sentence; the six months suspended for two years comes from Donga Ilbo and Kyeongin Ilbo.
Outlets differ on the forfeiture order: Donga Ilbo reports 7.16 million won, while other coverage of this case reports 699,500 won or a prosecution demand of 6,690,500 won; the report uses the 7.16 million won the court was reported to have imposed.
The count of people charged is taken from the hearing coverage; Bianca Mobley had left for the United States and was not sentenced at this hearing, so no sentence is recorded for her.
The identities of the other defendants, a makeup artist and former English instructors, were reported only by surname or initial.
No weight or quantity of cannabis was published, so no cannabis figure can be recorded, and the forfeiture amount is money, not a street value.
Whether any defendant appealed after this first-instance sentence is not reported in the opened sources.
The JTBC page picture is uncaptioned and uncredited and is not established to show the courtroom or the defendants, so it is linked rather than used as a cover.
On 8 October 2026 the Suwon District Court sentenced a 53-year-old Korean resident of Japan, a former yakuza member, to 10 years for importing 636 kg of cannabis from Laem Chabang in Thailand to Incheon on 23 March. Prosecutors had asked for 20 years. The drugs were forfeited.
South Korea's Supreme Court on 3 July 2025 upheld actor Yoo Ah-in's one-year prison term suspended for two years and 2 million won fine for habitual drug use that included smoking marijuana in the United States. The ruling, which dismissed the prosecution's appeal for a heavier sentence, ended a 19-month case and confirmed the release he won when an appellate court set aside his prison term.
Seoul Central District Court sentenced former BTOB member Jung Il-hoon to two years in prison on 10 June 2021 for habitually buying and smoking marijuana from 2016 to 2019. Seven co-defendants were also sentenced to 18 months to two years, and Jung was taken into custody immediately.
The Suwon District Court on 13 April 2009 gave American players Terrence Shannon, DeAngelo Collins and Calvin Warner six-month prison terms suspended for one year for smoking marijuana at a Seoul hotel in January. Collins admitted the charge while Shannon and Warner denied it, and all three had already been expelled by their clubs.
