The disgraced founder of embattled stablecoin issuer Terra (LUNA) has reportedly been arrested in Montenegro after months of being on the run.
According to a new report by local Korean media outlet Yonhap News Agency, former Terra chief executive Do Kwon has been apprehended by authorities in the Balkan nation.
Though the police identified Kwon through his photo ID, they are currently awaiting the results of a fingerprint scan to confirm that the person they arrested was in fact Kwon. One of Kwon’s associates was also reportedly arrested at the time.
Kwon has been on the run for months after being charged with crimes by both the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and South Korean authorities for allegedly masterminding a multibillion-dollar fraud scheme.
The SEC accuses Kwon of illegally raising billions of dollars by lying to investors about the stability of Terra’s now-defunct algorithmic stablecoin, TerraUSD, as well as lying to investors that a popular Korean mobile payments app used LUNA’s blockchain to settle its transactions.
Last month, South Korean authorities, who have been hunting Kwon since issuing a warrant for his arrest last September, were able to trace Kwon’s location to Serbia, another country in the Balkans, ultimately leading to his arrest in Montenegro.
The Terra ecosystem initially collapsed in May 2022 after the project’s native asset and its stablecoin plummeted to essentially zero, wiping out nearly $60 billion in just a few days.
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