DEBT Box urges judge to toss suit as SEC got case ‘badly wrong’
DEBT Box and other defendants in a Securities and Exchange Commission lawsuit want the case tossed after the court found the agency lied to secure a temporary restraining order against them.
“The SEC got this case wrong. Badly wrong,” lawyers for Digital Licensing Inc., which does business as DEBT Box, told Utah federal court Judge Robert Shelby in a Dec. 4 motion to dismiss. “The SEC should not be allowed to continue to spin a false narrative to avoid dismissal.”
The SEC won a temporary restraining order to freeze DEBT Box assets on Aug. 3, claiming the firm would remove evidence and secretly transfer assets overseas if they were notified the order would be imposed on them.
The agency accused the firm of perpetrating a $50 million fraudulent crypto scheme. DEBT Box sold software mining licenses tied to real-world assets which the SEC claimed were unregistered securities.the defendants refute this claim.
“Not only are such allegations false, but they also fail to meet the basic pleading standards,” it wrote in its latest motion.
A Utah federal court reversed the asset freeze on Nov. 30 saying the SEC misrepresented evidence by claiming DEBT Box closed bank accounts and intended to move to the United Arab Emirates and escape the SEC’s jurisdiction.
The court found the firm didn’t close the bank accounts, and a $720,000 transfer the SEC alleged was sent overseas was actually sent domestically.
The SEC “misrepresents the state of law regarding crypto assets” in its “fatally flawed pleading,” DEBT Box said.
The SEC’s misrepresentation resulted in the issuance of a “show cause order” by Judge Shelby, mandating the regulator to provide reasons why they should not incur penalties for its actions.
SEC’s ‘shocking’ behavior deserves punishment, says Ripple executives
Ripple’s chief technology officer, David Schwartz, said the SEC’s behavior is “shocking.”
“The SEC went to a judge seeking an emergency order to paralyze several businesses and blatantly misrepresented facts to get it before anyone on the other side could defend themselves,” he said in a Dec. 5 X (Twitter) post.
Related: ‘We had to change strategies,’ says SEC enforcement director on recent actions: Report
Pro-Ripple lawyer John Deaton hopes the regulator will be forced to pay up for the damage done to DEBT Box.
The Debt Box case is a great example of why Judge Netburn felt COMPELLED to announce to the world that lawyers at the SEC “lack a faithful allegiance to the law” and do or say anything to advance its own agenda.
In Debt Box the SEC successfully obtained a temporary restraining… https://t.co/Qr2jrOyb1J
— John E Deaton (@JohnEDeaton1) December 5, 2023
DEBT Box’s four principals — Jason Anderson, his brother Jacob Anderson, Schad Brannon and Roydon Nelson — and 13 other individuals were included in the SEC’s action.
Magazine: Crypto regulation: Does SEC Chair Gary Gensler have the final say?
Politics
MP Zarah Sultana who was ousted from Labour announces she is starting new political party with Jeremy Corbyn
An MP who was ousted from the Labour Party has announced she is setting up a new political party with Jeremy Corbyn.
Independent MP Zarah Sultana said she and the former Labour leader will co-lead the new party, which she did not provide a name for.
She said other independent MPs, campaigners and activists from across the country will join them, but did not name anyone.
Politics latest: Zarah Sultana’s stinging resignation letter
Ms Sultana also said she was “resigning” from the Labour Party after 14 years.
She was suspended as a Labour MP shortly after they came to power last summer for voting against the government maintaining the two-child benefit cap.
Several others from the left of the party, including Mr Corbyn, were also suspended for voting against the government, and also remained as independent MPs.
However, Ms Sultana was still a member of the Labour Party – until now.
Mr Corbyn has previously said the independent MPs who were suspended from Labour would “come together” to provide an “alternative.
The other four are: Iqbal Mohamed, Shockat Adam, Ayoub Khan and Adnan Hussain.
Mr Corbyn and the other four independents have not said if they are part of the new party Ms Sultana announced.
In her announcement, Ms Sultana said she would vote to abolish the two-child benefit cap again and also voted against scrapping the winter fuel payment for most pensioners.
Ms Sultana also voted against the government’s welfare bill this week, which was heavily watered down as Sir Keir Starmer tried to prevent a major rebellion from his own MPs.
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Protesters block Israeli arms manufacturer in Bristol
On Wednesday, Ms Sultana spoke passionately against Palestine Action being proscribed as a terror organisation – but MPs eventually voted for it to be.
She said to proscribe it is “a deliberate distortion of the law to chill dissent, criminalise solidarity and suppress the truth”.
Ms Sultana said they were founding the new party because “Westminster is broken but the real crisis is deeper – just 50 families now own more wealth than half the UK population”.
She called Reform leader Nigel Farage “a billionaire-backed grifter” leading the polls “because Labour has completely failed to improve people’s lives.
Ms Sultana called Nigel Farage a ‘billionaire-backed grifter’. Pic: PA
The MP, who has spoken passionately about Gaza, added: “Across the political establishment, from Farage to Starmer, they smear people of conscience trying to stop a genocide in Gaza as terrorists.
“But the truth is clear: this government is an active participant in genocide. And the British people oppose it.
“We are not going to take this anymore.”
A Labour Party spokesperson said: “In just 12 months, this Labour government has boosted wages, delivered an extra four million NHS appointments, opened 750 free breakfast clubs, secured three trade deals and four interest rate cuts lowering mortgage payments for millions.
“Only Labour can deliver the change needed to renew Britain.”
Roman Storm is scheduled to appear in a New York courtroom for his criminal trial on July 14, facing money laundering and conspiracy charges.
The Wyoming Senator seeks to end double taxation and add clarity to the tax treatment of crypto staking, mining, and lending transactions.
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