In an ongoing lawsuit between Ripple and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), pro-Ripple attorney Jeremy Hogan has accused the regulator of obstructing the litigation on Twitter in a post on August 4. Recently, the Ripple team claimed that the SEC wants to restart discovery in the case in a letter to Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn. The SEC has been accused by Ripple of stalling the case on many occasions.
Ripple simply wants to authenticate 7 videos of SEC employees giving speeches and the SEC is messing around AGAIN with it (the SEC played games in responding originally last year).
Authentication is standard stuff in litigation and should not be this difficult. https://t.co/tUizICh18V pic.twitter.com/KSVQNLpQ82
— Jeremy Hogan (@attorneyjeremy1) August 4, 2022
What’s the recent matter in Ripple vs SEC?
Recently, Ripple has asked the court’s approval to serve non-party subpoenas in order to get downloadable copies of a number of videotapes in which the agency’s representatives are heard making public statements. As a result, in order for Ripple’s legal team to be able to retrieve the necessary material, videotapes subpoenas must now be issued. The materials will be authenticated by the SEC when Ripple’s motion to serve subpoenas on the relevant firms is granted by the court.Â
The SEC, however, is not going to grant that request. The SEC is asking the court to begin discovery so it may serve its own series of subpoenas and obtain copies of certain recordings to support its own accusations. SEC has neither confirmed nor denied that the voice recordings of its personnel, including former commissioner Robert Jackson, were legitimate.
Jackson, a former SEC commissioner under Donald Trump administration had made contentious comments regarding the SEC’s strategy for regulating cryptocurrencies in a January interview. He asserted that the regulator purposefully avoided providing clarification on this matter, particularly regarding the question of whether digital assets qualify as securities, and instead preferred to focus on communicating with the market.
Hogan claims that the SEC is only playing about and that authentication is a common practice that shouldn’t be too challenging. Hogan also requested Judge Torres to see these tapes, particularly the ones with Robert Jackson.
Also, on a personal note, I hope that Ripple gets these videos authenticated because 3 of them are of former Commissioner Robert Jackson!
And Judge Torres NEEDS to see his videos just for entertainment value. pic.twitter.com/Mm1jb2QdF9
— Jeremy Hogan (@attorneyjeremy1) August 4, 2022
The Ripple v. SEC lawsuit has now reached an unpleasant stage and both parties are aggressively arguing their points of view as the dispute goes on. Ripple appears attempting to broaden and grow the scope of activity, despite the fact that it has proven that forced expenditures for the case will total more than $100 million.
