freedom4chris

Summary:

British citizen Chris Emms who worked closely with Roger Ver, is a regular speaker on cryptocurrencies. He was invited to a cryptocurrency conference in North Korea following President Trump’s visitation and remarks that there was hope for a future friendship. Chris checked with the British Ambassador before his visit and was advised that while he probably won’t enjoy it, it was perfectly legal for him to go. A number of attendees joined him from different countries, including one US citizen (Virgil Griffith) who he met for the first time, at the event. After a few days in Pyongyang, the conference was over and Chris resumed his normal life.

He was later flagged at the airport in London and contacted by the FBI about the conference. He fully cooperated with their inquiries, not imagining that there could be any issue with him. During the (lengthy) conversations, the FBI began accusing him of violating US sanctions, something he adamantly denied and in any case, didn’t apply to him. He was told they could prosecute him under IEEPA and that juries will automatically convict him based on the mere mention of “North Korea” and “sanctions”. No non-US person has ever been prosecuted successfully under IEEPA, but Chris didn’t think it was even fair to ask him to come to the US, be put in pre-trial detention and have to fight an unfair prosecution. After all, he’s not American and doesn’t have to follow US law. He didn’t violate any UK sanctions or international laws.

Chris was pushed to provide false testimony against another high value target but refused to do so, explaining to them that if he did, he would be perjuring himself. They tried to persuade him to do so, offering him a ‘plea deal’ where they would reduce the IEEPA allegation to a catch-all “wire fraud” that carried a lesser and likely non-custodial sentence. It would however taint his reputation for life. Chris refused to perjure himself and partake in dirty tricks to help lock up a potentially innocent man who he had nothing to do with, (apart from attending the same busy conference in Puerto Rico once). Chris also refused to plead guilty to a crime he had not committed and tarnish his name forever. He was only in his 20’s and had his whole life ahead of him. Being in the financial sector, it was important to him not to have a phoney conviction for wire fraud.

Chris did not hear anything for some time. In fact, he thought they’d realised he wouldn’t cooperate with the witness testimony request and moved on though he kept in touch via the Embassy in Dubai where he was living temporarily. No problems seemed apparent.