A lawyer and XRP enthusiast is attempting to insert a “motion to Intervene” in the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) lawsuit against Ripple, arguing that the case caused the crypto asset to lose billions of dollars in value.
John Deaton, managing partner at Deaton Law Firm, which focuses on asbestos litigation, first filed a Motion to Intervene on March 14th on behalf of six XRP holders. Deaton filed the motion “for the purpose of protecting their substantial interests that will be greatly impacted by the disposition of this action.”
Deaton says that the existing parties in the case do not adequately represent the interest of XRP holders.
And in the “Memorandum of Law” filed in support of the motion, the lawyer argues the SEC’s lawsuit caused more than $15 billion in losses for people that own the crypto asset.
“The SEC’s stated mission and goals are to protect investors, promote fairness and share information about companies… to help investors make informed decisions and invest with confidence. Instead of protecting investors and sharing information to help investors make informed decisions the SEC knowingly and intentionally caused multi-billion-dollar losses to innocent holders who have purchased, exchanged, received and/or acquired the digital asset XRP.”
Judge Analisa Torres, who is presiding over the case, promptly denied the motion “without prejudice.”
Deaton, however, says the quick dismissal was simply due to a formatting error and that he plans to refile the motion.
“It was denied ‘without prejudice’ with the ability to refile in accordance with Judge Torres’ local rules. This simply means it must be refiled as a letter motion. I’m on it, please don’t get discouraged.”
The SEC filed its lawsuit against Ripple in late December, declaring that XRP is a security and accusing the San Francisco payments company of selling the crypto asset without proper authorization.
Numerous U.S. exchanges, including Coinbase, Bitstamp, Binance, Kraken, Bitwise, Simplex, B2C2, Crypto.com, delisted or suspended XRP trading following the SEC’s charges.
Don't Miss a Beat – Subscribe to get email alerts delivered directly to your inboxFeatured Image: Shutterstock/Sergey Nivens