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YG Entertainment founder gets suspended jail term for wielding coercion in attempt to conceal drug scandal

November 8, 2023

Yang Hyun-suk, founder and former head of K-pop agency YG Entertainment, was sentenced to six months in prison, suspended for a year, on charges of attempting to coerce a former trainee to reverse her police testimonies in an attempt to block an investigation into a drug scandal.

The Seoul High Court delivered the verdict, overturning a lower court’s acquittal of him over charges that he threatened the former trainee who had testified to police in 2016 about drug suspicions surrounding B.I, a former member of YG’s boy band iKON.

After the district court’s acquittal, prosecutors pressed additional charges against Yang, accusing him of coercing the trainee to have a face-to-face meeting with him in an attempt to reverse her testimonies in connection to B.I’s alleged drug use.

On Wednesday, the appeals court found Yang guilty of using his status as a de facto CEO to have the former trainee reverse testimonies, thereby violating the benefit and protection of the criminal judicature.

The court, however, upheld the lower court’s decision that acquitted him of charges related to revenge blackmailing the trainee, citing unreliability of the testimonies.

Yang Hyun-suk, founder and former head of YG Entertainment, appears at the Seoul High Court to attend a trial on Nov. 8, 2023. (Yonhap)
Yang Hyun-suk, founder and former head of YG Entertainment, appears at the Seoul High Court to attend a trial on Nov. 8, 2023. (Yonhap)