Do Kwon protests possible extradition to US
US SEC seeks $5.3 bil. fine on crypto mogul, Terraform Labs
Fallen crypto mogul Do Kwon of Terraform Labs wants to avoid extradition to the United States and be sent to his native Korea, protesting a Montenegrin court’s decision to leave the door wide open for potential extradition to the U.S.
Kwon’s lawyers in Montenegro appealed the Podgorica High Court’s ruling on April 10 that conditions for his extradition to both the U.S. and Korea were met, according to Montenegrin media outlets, Tuesday.
The Montenegrin capital of Podgorica is where Kwon was arrested and has been detained since March 2023 after he was wanted by both Korean and U.S. authorities for multibillion-dollar fraud.
The case centers on the now-defunct Terraform Labs that Kwon co-founded and his algorithmic stablecoin Terra, as well as its sister token Luna, which crashed and shook global cryptocurrency markets in 2022.
The crash was estimated to have wiped out more than $40 billion.
The Podgorica High Court’s ruling was the latest decision concerning Kwon’s fate.
The courts and prosecutor’s offices in Montenegro — both at the high and lower levels — have been challenging one another’s decisions for months over where the Korean fugitive should be extradited.
Kwon’s legal representatives, according to sources familiar with the matter, have been pushing for his extradition to Korea in hopes of receiving a lighter sentence.
In their appeals, the representatives said that the Podgorica High Court’s April 10 decision was “unfounded and illegal.”
They said relevant legal provisions were interpreted in a bizarre manner by the high court and the Supreme Court in an attempt to satisfy the wishes of Montenegrin Justice Minister Andrej Milovic.
Milovic will make the final call on the destination for Kwon’s extradition. He expressed his desire multiple times to hand him over to the U.S. authorities.
The disgraced crypto tycoon already faces hefty financial trouble from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
On April 19, the SEC filed a motion against Kwon, demanding that he be fined $5.3 billion following the commission’s win in a civil fraud trial in New York.
The amount includes nearly $4.7 billion in disgorgement and prejudgment interest following the Terra-Luna case.
Kwon will also have to forfeit $100 million of his own money in civil penalties, while Terraform Labs will have to pay $420 million, respectively.
Severe criminal punishment against Kwon in case of his extradition to the U.S. is expected, especially after another failed crypto mogul, Sam Bankman-Fried, was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Bankman-Fried founder of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange received the jail term, March 28, after being convicted of stealing billions of dollars from customers.