Why Wiz Khalifa Got Sentenced to 9 Months for Weed
A Romanian court determined that Wiz Khalifa was normalizing illegal conduct by smoking marijuana on stage at a 2024 festival, though it is highly unlikely he will be extradited.
Wiz Khalifa attends Universal's "Him" premiere at the TCL Chinese theatre in Hollywood, California on September 17, 2025.
Photo by VALERIE MACON/AFP via Getty Images.
Wiz Khalifa got some bad news just before Christmas; the hip-hop star was hit with a jail sentence in Romania. The BBC reports that Wiz has been sentenced in absentia to 9 months in prison following an appeal related to a drug possession case stemming from a 2024 concert.
Here’s what you need to know:
1. In July 2024, the rapper, (born Cameron Jibril Thomaz), was detained after allegedly smoking marijuana onstage during a performance at a festival in Costinești, a seaside town in Romania. He was charged with illegal possession of cannabis, which is banned under Romanian law.
2. According to Law Commentary, Constanța Tribunal initially slapped Wiz with just a monetary penalty of 3,000 lei (roughly $690) for possession of a controlled substance for personal use. But prosecutors challenged that decision.
3. The Constanța branch of Romania’s Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) handles drug-related offenses, and it appealed the decision. The appellate court sided with DIICOT, and overturned the fine. They issued a 9-month prison sentence for unlawful possession of “dangerous drugs for personal use.”
4. There are currently no plans to extradite Wiz back to Romania, as legal experts note that extradition over nonviolent drug offenses involving foreign nationals is rare.
5. In a written decision, the Constanța Court of Appeal judges said they overturned the original fine because Wiz sent "a message of normalization of illegal conduct" and thereby encouraged "drug use among young people".
The judges went on to describe Khalifa as "a music performer, on the stage of a music festival well known among young people" who "possessed and consumed, in front of a large audience predominantly made up of very young people, an artisanal cigarette.”
Romanian criminologist Vlad Zaha told BBC News the sentence is "unusually harsh.”
"Given the defendant's wealth and connections, Romania's lack of real negotiating power on extradition, and the legal and political status of cannabis in the U.S., it is highly unlikely that Wiz Khalifa will be sent to serve a prison sentence in Constanța,” Zaha says. “Even though a formal judicial request will be submitted to the United States.”
