The 34th Criminal Settlement Division of the Seoul Central District Court said on Jan. 3 that it found Lee Jung-hoon, the former president of South Korean cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb, not guilty of the charges brought against him. .

Due to allegations of fraud, Jung-Hoon was prosecuted for allegedly violating the Law on Aggravated Punishment for Specific Economic Crimes (Law on Aggravated Punishment for Specific Economic Crimes).

Since October 2018, when negotiations for the acquisition of Bithumb from Kim Byung-gun, president of cosmetic surgery company BK Group, were underway, the case has been ongoing. The former president is alleged to have defrauded Kim Byung-gun out of 100 billion won ($70 million) during those negotiations.

Had Jung-hoon been found guilty, the maximum sentence he could have received was eight years in prison.

According to local press, in Bithumb’s formal response to the ruling, the company stated that it respects the decision made by the court.

The conversation also made it clear that the company is run by “professional management” and that the previous president is not involved in day-to-day business activities.

After being accused of embezzlement and stock price manipulation, Bithumb’s largest executive shareholder, Park Mo, was discovered dead on December 30, nearly a week before the decision was issued.

In August 2022, the Singaporean courts delivered a verdict finding Byung-gun guilty of selling BXA tokens without first obtaining Jung’s permission. Hoon’s These recent events are a direct result of that verdict.

As a result of the verdict, he was required to hand over all the money he had earned from the sale of BXA to the BTHMB organization, which is based in Singapore.

Later, in October 2022, Jung-hoon cited a mental health issue as the reason why he was unable to attend a parliamentary session held during the turmoil that occurred within the Terra environment.

In the wake of the failure of the Terra Luna cryptocurrency exchange, the South Korean government placed a search warrant on many companies, including Bithumb.