According to a report from a local news media, law enforcement agencies in South Korea issued an arrest warrant against LUNA Founder and Terraform Labs CEO Kwon Do-Hyeong also known as Do Kwon. The founder has been under authorities’ radar since the collapse of the Terra ecosystem in May 2022.
The arrest warrant was issued by the Seoul Southern District Prosecutor’s Office’s Financial and Securities Crime Unit, which is under the direction of Dan Seong-Han, the report claims. This institution has been investigating the LUNA Founder with its Financial Investigation Division and five prosecutors.
As Bitcoinist reported, an investigation against Do Kwon has been underway for several months. In July, authorities in South Korea raided at least seven exchange platforms and a total of 15 businesses looking into the events related to the Terra ecosystem collapse.
Some of the largest crypto exchanges in the country, such as Bithumb, Upbit, Korbit, and others were probed. In addition, several Terraform Labs were instructed to stay in South Korea.
The recent arrest warrant was the product of this investigation as authorities were allegedly able to find evidence of a violation of the South Korean Capital Markets Act. This regulation classified Terra (LUNA) as a security that was illegally offered without its registration.
At the time of writing, the LUNA Founder is still at large as he changed his residency to Singapore. In that sense, South Korean authorities planned to use international tools, via Interpol’s red wanted alert and invalidating Kwon’s passport, to apprehend him.
LUNA Founder Denied Contact With South Korean Authorities
At its peak, the Terra (LUNA) ecosystem was valued at over $40 billion with this cryptocurrency occupying a position in the top 10 by market capitalization. After its collapse, there were reports of a series of suicides related to the crash as some investors saw their net worth evaporate.
At the events, the LUNA Founder claimed to be “heartbroken about the pain my invention has brought on all of you”. There have been plans and proposals to bring LUNA back to its former glory, including a hard fork that separated the original cryptocurrency, to be known as LUNA Classic (LUNC), from a new iteration.
However, the arrest warrant might suppress any attempts of success in that regard. In one of his recent interviews, Do Kwon denied that he was contacted by South Korean authorities, and dismissed any plans for him to return to this country.
Community Launches Jail Kwon Token
The arrest warrant has a one-year duration and also requests the capture of Nicholas Platias, another LUNA Founder, and Han Mo, a Terraform Labs employee. All of these suspects reside in Singapore with Do Kwon and possibly will fall under Interpol’s radar.
Commenting on recent events, the pseudonym account known as FatMan, a Do Kwon detractor that has collaborated with the filing of class action against the LUNA Founder for his alleged participation in the Terra collapse, said:
Do Kwon, the man who brought so much horror and suffering to thousands of people across the world for his own enrichment, is now officially a wanted fugitive. A great day for justice. And there are still a few more shoes left to drop. May the best man win.
Data from Coingecko shows that someone launch an Ethereum ERC-20 and called him Jail Kwon with the ticker JKWON as news about the arrest warrant broke. The token was seeing 427% profits over the last 24 hours.
The original LUNA token was also on a rally but has been trending to the downside following the general market sentiment since yesterday September 13th.
