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The Appellate Court Decision on Do Kwon’s Extradition
The Appellate Court of Montenegro has recently made a ruling regarding the appeal of Do Kwon to halt his extradition to South Korea. As of March 20, the Court has declined Kwon’s appeal, affirming the previous decision by the High Court to deport him to face criminal charges in South Korea.
These criminal charges are directly related to Kwon’s alleged involvement in the collapse of Terra’s algorithmic UST stablecoin. The collapse resulted in substantial losses exceeding $40 billion for investors on a global scale. The Court has specified that its ruling is final and cannot be contested by any concerned parties, indicating that Kwon’s extradition is imminent.
Significance of the Court’s Decision
This decision has marked a significant turning point in Kwon’s legal battle against extradition. The high-profile nature of his case has drawn significant international attention, with both the United States and South Korea vying for custody over him.
Key Facets of the Extradition Process
The initial ruling by a Montenegrin high court favored Kwon’s extradition to the US. However, this decision was later overturned by the Appellate Court due to procedural irregularities within the Montenegrin criminal justice system. As a result, a retrial was ordered at the High Court of Podgorica.
In the subsequent trial, it was determined that Kwon should be extradited to South Korea, as their extradition request had precedence over that of the US. The Appellate Court upheld this decision, emphasizing the timeliness of South Korea’s extradition request as the determining factor.
“The panel of the Court of Appeals assessed that the first-instance court had correctly established that the request of the Republic of South Korea arrived earlier in the order of arrival compared to the request of the USA.”
Notably, Terraform Labs’ chief financial officer, Han Chang-Joon, was deported to South Korea from Montenegro last month to also face criminal charges. Both Chang-Joon and Kwon had been detained in Montenegro for traveling with falsified official documents, further complicating their legal situations.
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