Montenegro’s Court of Appeals has rejected a US request to extradite former Terraform Labs CEO Do Kwon, meaning the businessman will be sent to South Korea.
Do Kwon will return to his homeland
The Montenegrin Court of Appeals has rejected the US request to extradite Do Kwon. It also ruled that he be transferred to South Korea, his homeland.
The Court of Appeal thus confirmed the earlier decision of the Supreme Court in Podgorica, which was taken at the end of June this year.
It is worth adding that the case lasted for months. Kwon’s lawyers tried to have their client sent to South Korea, where he faces a maximum sentence of 40 years in prison (he will probably end up serving a much shorter sentence). In the US, it is possible that the creator of Terra would receive a much harsher sentence.
History of the Fall
Do Kwon’s story is the story of Icarus – from rise to fall. The businessman successfully created and promoted Terra. The project was to offer the market an algorithmic stablecoin, USDT. However, the groundbreaking solution turned out to be something – to put it mildly – unsuccessful. The project collapsed, generating losses of investors worth as much as USD 40 billion.
The case has sparked interest from services around the world. Even Interpol has tried to help arrest the businessman.
But nothing helped. Kwon simply disappeared into thin air – he disappeared and no arrests were made for several months. During that time, he was mocking the services, writing posts on social media in which he claimed that he was not hiding at all. At the same time, he did not show up for interrogations in South Korea, which suggested that he was hiding somewhere and trying to escape justice. This suggests that Terra was a scam.
He was finally arrested at the airport in Montenegro in March 2023. The reason? He tried to cross the border using a fake passport. For this, he was also sentenced to prison in the country of detention. He has been waiting for a decision on which country he will ultimately end up in for the past few months.
The United States and South Korea tried to acquire it. As we know today, Do Kwon will ultimately go to the latter country.
