Do Kwon Will Not Go to U.S. as Montenegro Revokes Extradition

Will they or won’t they? The Montenegro Court of Appeals has revoked its agreement that would have allowed the U.S. to extradite former TerraForm Labs CEO Do Kwon, according to a statement issued by the court.

The decision to extradite Kwon was originally made by the High Court of Podgorica in early December. But a few weeks later, his lawyers filed an appeal and he was allowed to stay in Montenegro while the appellate court heard the case.

The court decided that the original decision to extradite Kwon was “affected by significant violations,” according to a translated copy of the news release, “because the wording of the decision is incomprehensible, the decisions has no reason for decisive facts, and the reasons given are unclear.”

The statement went on to say that the lower court ignored the order of arrival of the requests for extradition, implying that South Korea was the first to seek extradition of Kwon.

Kwon has been in Montenegro since last year and recently served time for using a false passport. After a court foudn him guilty, it sentenced him to four months in prison​​​​. But there’s a tug of war over extraditing Kwon to the U.S. or South Korea because of alleged fraud linked to Terraform Labs.

In the states, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a lawsuit accusing him of orchestrating a multibillion-dollar crypto securities fraud. Additionally, the Southern District of New York’s U.S. Attorney’s Office has brought forward criminal charges against him, related to the collapse of the Terraform Labs stablecoin, TerraUSD (TUSD).

Just a month ago, Kwon and his lawyers asked that the SEC trial be postponed so there would be a “realistic possibility” that he could attend in person. But now that the issue is moot.