US Gains Chance In Do Kwon Case After Montenegro Challenges S. Korea Extradition

The United States may still be able to get fallen crypto magnate Do Kwon extradited to the country after Montenegro's top prosecutor's office challenged the High Court's decision to allow the Terraform Labs founder's extradition to his home country.

In its announcement Thursday, Montenegro's Office of the Supreme State Prosecutor indicated that the High Court may have overstepped its authority in allowing Kwon Do Hyeong, known in the cryptocurrency realm as Do Kwon, to be extradited to South Korea, through abbreviated proceedings – a special criminal process aimed at expediting prosecution.

"In the specific case, the court, contrary to the law, conducted abbreviated, instead of regular proceedings, and by exceeding the limits of its powers, made a decision on the permission of extradition, which is the exclusive competence of the Minister of Justice," the top prosecutor argued in its Thursday notice, as per a Google translation.

Furthermore, the Montenegrin Supreme State Prosecutor's Office said the Appellate Court "did not hear the state prosecutor" in its appeal procedure, a move that the state prosecutor said was a violation of "the provisions of the criminal procedure, and which had an impact on the adoption of a legal court decision."

This specific violation as pointed out by the Supreme/Chief State Prosecutor is backed by Montenegrin law that says: "The Chief State Prosecutor shall proceed before the Supreme Court of the Republic of Montenegro, Appellate Court of the Republic of Montenegro and Administrative Court of the Republic of Montenegro, other courts and other authorities, in accordance with the law."

For the said reasons, the top prosecutor has filed a request for the protection of legality, which is lodged against a final judicial decision – an authority given to Montenegro's Chief State Prosecutor by law.

While the announcement did not specifically say the U.S. now has a chance to get Kwon extradited to American soil, the chief state prosecutor did propose to the Supreme Court "to issue a verdict that would change the Court's decision" on the fallen crypto mogul's extradition to South Korea.

This comes just a day after the Montenegrin appeals court confirmed that the "request of the Republic of South Korea arrived earlier in the order of arrival compared to the request of the USA."

Kwon is faced with fraud-related charges in the U.S. and his home country. The two countries immediately moved to request for his extradition shortly after his arrest in Montenegro earlier last year over fake travel documents.