The Higher Court in the Montenegrin capital, Podgorica, has given the green light for the extradition of Do Kwon, co-founder of Terraform Labs, following extradition requests from both South Korea and the United States.
The charges against Kwon are related to financial crimes in both nations, as stated by the court on Friday. While Kwon has expressed willingness to be extradited to South Korea, the final decision on the priority of extradition will rest with the Minister of Justice of Montenegro, the court clarified.
Upon ministerial approval, Kwon is set to be extradited after serving a four-month prison term in Montenegro for document forgery, according to the court’s announcement.
Kwon’s legal troubles began in March when he was initially apprehended in Montenegro for attempting to leave the country using a counterfeit passport. Despite securing release from jail on a $436,000 bail in May, a Montenegro court sentenced him to four months in prison in June for document forgery. Following an unsuccessful appeal earlier this month, Kwon is now facing a four-month jail term.
The global hunt for Kwon intensified in September 2022 when Interpol issued a red notice for him in connection to the May 2022 collapse of his two created tokens, TerraUSD and Luna. This collapse resulted in a staggering $40 billion loss in investor wealth within a few days.
In a related development, in April of the same year, Terraform’s co-founder Daniel Shin was indicted in South Korea for violating capital markets laws, leading to the freezing of $185 million in assets. Shin, however, distanced himself from the Terra collapse, asserting that he had severed ties with the company two years prior to the incident.