Seoul court acquits ‘Jonber Kim’ in 340 billion won Podo and Artube token case

A Seoul court acquitted the South Korean crypto influencer known as “Jonber Kim” on 15 October 2026 of fraud, aggravated breach of trust and market manipulation, in a case where prosecutors alleged that about 340 billion won was raised through two tokens, Podo and Artube. Several trade outlets convert that to about $230 million; Bitcoin.com, which brought the ruling to English-language readers on 19 October, puts it at $253 million. Prosecutors had asked for 20 years in prison.

The first-instance verdict came from Criminal Division 13 of the Seoul Southern District Court, presided over by Judge Seo Bo-min, and was reported the same day by the Newsis news agency and Korea Economic TV. The court did not say the projects were clean. It found that parts of the white papers and Telegram promotion misled the public, then ruled that prosecutors had not proved that buyers were deceived by them and bought because of it.

Two defendants were convicted, but not on the headline charges. The chief executive of Entablock, the company behind Podo, and one of his employees were found guilty of obstructing the listing review of the Korean exchange Coinone with false documents. Both received suspended prison terms.

Jonber Kim acquitted on all three counts: who was tried and what each got

The name “Jonber Kim” is an online nickname. In Korean, 존버 is slang for holding on through a market slump, close to “hodl” in English crypto slang, and he was also called the “coin king”. Korean media identify him only as Park, aged 45 at the verdict; his full name has not been published. According to Korea Economic TV and Bitcoin.com, he built his following by showing off luxury cars on social media and online forums and attributing his wealth to digital assets.

The court ruled on four defendants, according to Korea Economic TV (WOW TV) and the Newsis report carried by Newstong:

• Park, known as Jonber Kim, was found not guilty of fraud, aggravated breach of trust under the Act on the Aggravated Punishment of Specific Economic Crimes, and market manipulation.
• Moon, chief executive of the company that developed the Artube platform, was found not guilty.
• Han, 42, chief executive of Entablock, was cleared of fraud and breach of trust but convicted of obstruction of business, with six months in prison suspended for two years.
• An Entablock employee, also surnamed Park but a different person from Jonber Kim, was convicted of obstruction of business and given four months, suspended for one year.

The shared surname has already confused some reports. Digital Asset’s write-up is not consistent about which Park received the four-month term; Newsis attributes it to the Entablock employee, and that is the version used here.

What prosecutors alleged about the Podo and Artube tokens

Prosecutors alleged that Park issued and listed two tokens with no intention or ability to build the businesses they were sold on, promoted them with false claims, manipulated their prices and then sold out. The court rejected that case, so every element below is the prosecution’s account, not a finding.

The first token, Podo (POD, sometimes rendered “Grape” coin), was developed by Entablock. Prosecutors alleged that the scheme around it ran from February 2021 to April 2022 and brought in 80.9 billion won, according to a July 2025 report by Herald Economy. They also alleged that Han, Entablock’s chief executive, issued Podo in December 2020, pushed its price up with false promotion and trading, and gained about 21.6 billion won selling to retail investors, WOW TV reported.

The second token, Artube (ATT), was tied to a platform whose developer, Moon, was charged alongside Park. Korean outlets spell the name differently, with Newsis using a variant that reads closer to “Acube”. Prosecutors put the alleged proceeds at 260 billion won between March 2021 and April 2022. Added to the Podo figure, that gives about 340.9 billion won, the basis of the “340 billion won” in Korean headlines.

At the closing hearing in August 2026, prosecutors asked for 20 years in prison, crypto outlets including Coinotag reported at the time. WOW TV reported that they also sought forfeiture of about 18.8 billion won, which Bitcoin.com describes as over $14 million. The number of people who bought the tokens, or who say they lost money, has not been published in any report we found.

The dollar figures vary because no outlet says which exchange rate it used. Several trade sites give about $230 million, a CoinStats item from August gave $247 million and Bitcoin.com gives $253 million. The won amount is the one used in court.

The court found misleading promotion but no proof buyers relied on it

The ruling turns on a distinction that Korean fraud law makes explicit. Deceiving people is not enough. Prosecutors must show that the deception led a victim into a mistaken belief and that the victim handed over money because of that mistake. The court said the first part was partly there: according to Digital Asset, the judges found that “deception is partly recognised” (in Korean, 기망행위가 일부 인정되지만), because the white papers and Telegram messages promoted the projects while the defendants lacked the intention or ability to carry them out and did not disclose how the work was really going.

The second part failed. Because the promotion was aimed at the public at large rather than at specific people, the court held that the mistake and the causal link had to be proved for each victim. Prosecutors could not do that.

Why each buyer’s reasons mattered

Some of the alleged victims could not be identified or confirmed at all, Newsis reported. Others had bought for reasons that had nothing to do with the white papers. Bitcoin.com quotes the ruling as saying “there are cases where they purchased based on blogs, Youtube, communities, or acquaintances’ introductions”. For some buyers, the reason for buying could not be established.

Even buyers who said they had read the white paper did not settle the question. The court said it could not rule out that they had bought for short-term trading profit, in which case the misleading claims about the projects would not be what made them pay.

Newsis described one named victim, surnamed Kim, whose claim was found unproven: the evidence did not show who had sold him Podo tokens or who had profited from the sale.

No legal definition of a “scam coin”

The court also addressed the label that hung over the case from the start. Korean statute and case law contain no definition of a “scam coin”, the judges said, so calling a token one cannot by itself prove deception. Each defendant’s conduct has to be examined on its own, Newsis reported.

Market manipulation and breach of trust

On market manipulation, the court found that the evidence did not show how prices had actually been affected. Mentioning buy prices or target prices in a chat room was not enough, and trades that really took place on an exchange are not “false prices”, according to Newsis and Digital Asset.

The breach-of-trust charge rested on the idea that Podo belonged to Entablock and was misused. The court found evidence that 55% of the Podo allocation went to Park and the remainder was split among others, so it was not proved that the company owned the coins in the first place.

The only convictions: false documents for Coinone’s listing review

The guilty verdicts concern how Podo got onto an exchange. Twice in August 2021, according to Newsis, Han gave Coinone’s listing team papers claiming staff had been hired and would be paid, along with transaction records, none of which matched the facts. In its listing-maintenance review the following month, Coinone concluded the requirements were met and did not put Podo on its caution list.

That conduct was treated as obstruction of business, a charge that protects the exchange’s review process rather than buyers’ money, which is why it could be proved without tracing any individual purchase. When setting the sentences, the court took into account that Han and the employee admitted the facts, along with their previous records, WOW TV and Newsis reported.

For people who trade on centralised platforms, the episode is a reminder that a listing is only as solid as the documents behind it. Our guide on how to choose a crypto exchange covers what to look for in an exchange’s listing and monitoring policies. Reports on the ruling do not say whether Coinone faces any consequences or whether Podo and Artube still trade anywhere.

From a failed bid to leave Korea to a 20-year request: the case timeline

Park’s legal troubles began well before this trial. In December 2023, with prosecutors closing in and a travel ban already imposed, he tried to leave the country illegally through a broker based in China and was caught, Herald Economy reported. He was convicted under the Smuggling Prevention Act, and the Supreme Court finalised a seven-month prison sentence in August 2024.

The same month, August 2024, he was indicted and detained in the Podo case. He was released on bail in January 2025 and detained again in February 2025 when the Artube case was filed. The two cases were merged. He applied for bail again on 9 July 2025, asking to be tried without detention; at the end of that month the Seoul Southern District Court refused, citing a risk that evidence could be destroyed, according to Herald Economy.

The trial closed in August 2026 with the 20-year request. The verdict followed on 15 October. Reports do not say whether he remains in custody after the acquittal.

What the ruling means for buyers misled by a white paper

The decision shows how hard it is to win a fraud case over a token sold to anonymous buyers through social media. A white paper that overstates a project’s prospects can be found misleading and still not lead to a fraud conviction, because the law asks what each buyer believed and why each one paid. When buyers came in through YouTube, forums, friends or simple speculation, that chain is difficult to rebuild years later.

The Seoul Southern District Court has not been lenient with crypto defendants in general. In August 2026 it sentenced Jeong Sang-ho, former chief executive of the crypto lender Delio, to 15 years for embezzling about $49.2 million, Bitcoin.com noted. In an embezzlement case the question is where customers’ money went, not what each customer believed when paying, and the second question is where the Podo and Artube case came apart.

Korea’s legal tools have also changed since the period in question. The Virtual Asset User Protection Act, in force since 19 July 2024 according to the Financial Services Commission, now bans unfair trading in crypto, including price manipulation and trading on undisclosed information. The conduct alleged in this case dates from 2020 to 2022, before that law applied, and the reports on the ruling do not discuss how it might affect similar cases.

In the European Union, the MiCA regulation takes a different route: the issuer of a crypto-asset white paper can be held liable to holders for misleading or incomplete information in it. There is no link between that framework and the Korean case, but it shows that white-paper accuracy can be policed outside criminal fraud law.

For readers, the practical point is that a court acquittal says nothing about whether a token was a sound purchase, and a “scam coin” label online says nothing about what a court will find. Our guide on spotting crypto scams and where to report them lists the warning signs that matter before money changes hands. Cross-border recovery of criminal crypto is moving on a separate track, as the Council of Europe treaty on seizing criminal crypto recently signed by the EU and eight states, shows.

Will prosecutors appeal the Jonber Kim acquittal?

The prosecution’s decision is not yet known. None of the Korean reports of 15 October, nor Bitcoin.com’s article four days later, mentions an appeal by either side. Han and the Entablock employee, the only two convicted, have not said whether they will contest their suspended sentences either.

Several facts are still missing. No report gives the number of alleged victims, the fate of the 18.8 billion won forfeiture request, or whether Podo and Artube remain listed anywhere. Coindaro could not open the original Yonhap report cited by Bitcoin.com, so the court’s reasoning here rests on Newsis, Korea Economic TV, Digital Asset and Bitcoin.com. The next thing to watch is whether prosecutors file an appeal, which would send the case to a second trial.