Ex-Penn law student gets 5-10 years in shooting incident
Joseph Cho, a bright but mentally troubled man who shocked his law-school classmates in 2007 by shooting into his neighbors' front door, was sentenced to five to 10 years in prison yesterday.
Joseph Cho, a bright but mentally troubled man who shocked his law-school classmates in 2007 by shooting into his neighbors' front door, was sentenced to five to 10 years in prison yesterday.
Philadelphia Common Pleas Judge Rose DeFino-Nastasi also ordered Cho to complete a 20-year probation period after he is released.
Cho, 34, who at the time of the shooting was a second-year Penn Law School student and is a graduate of Yale University, pleaded guilty Oct. 1 to attempted murder, burglary, aggravated assault and possession of an instrument of crime stemming from the Jan. 31, 2007, shooting incident.
On that day, Cho, who has since been diagnosed with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, left his third-floor apartment on Pine Street near 44th, walked one floor down and began pounding on the door of two male Drexel University students.
When no one answered, Cho began firing rounds from his 9mm handgun into the door's lock. Police said Cho suspected that his neighbors were terrorists, though they were actually bioengineering students of Indian descent.
The one student who was at home at the time of the shooting was not injured.
Cho, who has been in custody since the shooting, has been receiving mental-health treatment. The last semester he completed at Penn Law School was fall 2006, said Ron Ozio, director of Media Relations at the University of Pennsylvania.
Assistant District Attorney Melissa M. Francis said Cho was held responsible for his actions because, while he has mental-health issues, he is not legally insane. She had asked the judge to incarcerate him for eight to 20 years, but after the hearing said that the shorter sentence was appropriate.
Cho, she said, had no prior criminal record.
"I think it was a fair sentence considering his background and mental-health diagnosis. I think the judge handled this very well," the prosecutor said.