© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Zhao Changpeng, founder and CEO of Binance, attends the Viva technology conference dedicated to innovation and startups at the Porte de Versailles exhibition center in Paris, France, June 16, 2022. REUTERS/ Benoit Tessier/File Ph
By Nate Raymond
(Reuters) – Lawyers for former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao are urging a U.S. judge to reject the Justice Department’s request to bar him from returning to his home in the United Arab Emirates until he is sentenced for violating anti-trust requirements. money laundering.
Zhao’s lawyers asked U.S. District Judge Richard Jones in Seattle in a Thursday filing not to revoke bail conditions set by a judge Tuesday that would allow him to leave the United States while he awaits sentencing.
Zhao, a citizen of the United Arab Emirates and Canada, resigned as CEO of Binance on Tuesday after pleading guilty to intentionally causing the global cryptocurrency exchange to fail to maintain an effective anti-money laundering program.
US authorities said Binance violated US anti-money laundering and sanctions laws and failed to report more than 100,000 suspicious transactions with organizations the US described as terrorist groups, including Hamas, Al Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
The company, as part of a plea deal, agreed to pay more than $4.3 billion. Zhao agreed to pay a $150 million fine to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and prosecutors in a document filed Wednesday said he faces up to 18 months in prison.
The Justice Department asked Jones on Monday to reverse a decision by federal Judge Brian Tsuchida to allow Zhao to return to his home in the United Arab Emirates before his Feb. 23 sentencing, after he agreed to release him on bail of 175 million dollars.
The government said it may not be able to guarantee his return if he decides not to return to the United States for sentencing, given that it does not have an extradition treaty with the United Arab Emirates and Zhao is a billionaire with significant assets.
But Zhao’s lawyers argued that the former CEO had demonstrated that he was not a flight risk by accepting a “substantial” bail package and voluntarily coming to the United States to accept responsibility for his actions.
Allowing Zhao to return to the United Arab Emirates would allow him to care for his partner and three children and prepare them for his sentencing, defense lawyers argued.
The Justice Department responded in a writing Friday that its decision at Tuesday’s hearing to recommend that Zhao remain free before sentencing was “exceptional” and was only because it believed the flight risk he posed could be “controlled.” “restricting their travel.
“In the vast majority of cases, a billionaire defendant who has pleaded guilty, faces possible prison time and lives in a country that does not extradite its citizens to the United States would be detained,” the Department of Justice attorneys said. Justice.
