| Before
Griffith NoKo Trial US Says Reached At $1M
in Crypto, He Says Coinbase for Counsel
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Pod
Exclusive Patreon
BBC
- Guardian
UK - Honduras
- The
Source
SDNY COURTHOUSE,
July 16 – Virgil Griffith,
charged with violating North
Korea sanctions in connection
with a crypto-currency
conference there, now faces a
bail review proceeding - in
person - on July 20. To some,
this makes it more likely he
may be remanded to prison
custody, charged with trying
to access $1 million in
crypto-currency assets while
awaiting trial in September
2021 in the U.S. District
Court for the Southern
District of New York.
On July 9 the US
Attorney's Office wrote to
SDNY Judge P. Kevin Castel
saying Griffith attempted to
access one of his frozen
cryptocurrency accounts
containing assets of nearly $1
million. They went a hearing,
and they want him remanded
(jailed). Full letter on
Patreon here.
Now on July 13,
this: "MEMO ENDORSEMENT as to
Virgil Griffith on re: [119]
LETTER MOTION filed by USA
addressed to Judge P. Kevin
Castel from AUSAs Kimberly
Ravener and Kyle Wirshba dated
July 9, 2021 re: Violation of
Bail Conditions. ENDORSEMENT:
A bail review proceeding will
be held on July 20, 2021 at
2:00 p.m. in Courtroom 11D.
The defendant shall appear in
person."
Now on July 16,
Griffith's lawyers argue
that his parents accessed
Coinbase, given the run up in
ETH price, to pay for counsel:
"Given the impending trial
date, Mr. Griffith may need to
sell certain assets to fund
his legal defense. Mr.
Griffith consults closely with
his family on financial
matters and did so even
prior to his arrest. In
connection with their strategy
to assess and access necessary
resources to fund his
defense, and after consulting
counsel, his mother made an
online request to access a
U.S.- based and regulated
cryptocurrency exchange,
Coinbase... As the Court
knows, Mr. Griffith was an
employee of the Ethereum
Foundation and was paid
in Ether (ETH), a
digital asset used on the
Ethereum blockchain.4 At
the time Mr. Griffith
was arrested in November
2019, he held some ETH and
some ETC (a related
cryptocurrency)5 in a Coinbase
account worth less than
$100,000. Since then, one ETH
has risen from about $150
to about $1,900. The
government states that the
account assets are currently
worth almost $1 million.
Neither Mr. Griffith nor any
family member acting on his
behalf has had access to that
account since his
arrest. With the
September trial date quickly
approaching, and given ETH’s
current value, Mr.
Griffith has wished to
know the exact contents of his
Coinbase account and the value
of his assets, so he
could consider transferring or
selling all of part of his
cryptocurrency held there to
pay trialrelated expenses. As
is their family culture, Mr.
Griffith’s father, Dr. Robert
Griffith, has been
involved and consulted in
matters regarding assets and
plans to pay defense counsel."
Full letter on Patreon
here.
On February
11, Judge Castel held a
proceeding about who knew what
before and at the conference
Griffith spoke at. A
stipulation or agreement has
been proposed, essentially
that some people know, but the
DPRK / Kim government as such
did not. Inner City Press live
tweeted the first proceeding,
here.
And on
February 23 the second
proceeding, in two parts, here.
On June
16, Griffith's lawyers
complained that "the defense
is still awaiting the
completion of the government's
review and production... the
Government filed a letter
correcting a 'mistake' it had
made regarding its
presentations to the Court
about the FBI's first
interactions with OFAC... The
defense hopes that the
prosecutors will honor their
commitment to a June 22, 2021
deadline. If not, the defense
reserves its right to seek
relief from the Court." Watch
this site.
Back in
March 12, citing the swearing
into the office of US Attorney
General of Merrick Garland the
day before, the US Attorney's
Office has asked for a three
week delay for its Classified
Information Procedures Act
filings, since Garland must
sign them on personal
knowledge, under US v. Aref.
Others might wonder if the
change in Administration might
result in a changed
prosecutorial stance in this
and certain other cases.
The case is US v.
Griffith, 20-cr-15
(Castel).
***
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