Ava Labs CEO Emin Gün Sirer has dismissed sensational allegations from CryptoLeaks that his company used litigation to “harm” competitors and fool regulators, labeling it as “conspiracy theory nonsense.”
Sirer made the comments in an Aug. 28 Twitter post to his 280,500 followers, referring to an Aug. 26 article from CryptoLeaks alleging the company formed a “secret pact” with U.S. law firm Roche Freedman to use the American legal system “gangster style” to “attack and harm crypto organizations.”
How could anyone believe something so ridiculous as the conspiracy theory nonsense on Cryptoleaks? We would never engage in the unlawful, unethical and just plain wrong behavior claimed in these self-serving videos and inflammatory article. Our tech & team speak for themselves.
— Emin Gün Sirer (@el33th4xor) August 28, 2022
On Friday, CryptoLeaks published a series of candid videos from an unknown source purportedly showing U.S. Attorney Kyle Roche of Roche Freedman LLP detailing his partnership and relationship with Emin Gün Sirer and Kevin Sekniqi, the respective CEO and COO of Ava Labs.
CryptoLeaks claimed that Roche Freedman and Kyle Roche have a deal to provide Ava Labs with legal services in exchange for the AVAX tokens and Ava Labs equity, and would also use “litigation as a tool” to disrupt competitors and misdirect regulators such as the Security Exchange Commission (SEC) and Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
The publication also said the videos of Roche suggest there was a tight-knit relationship between Roche and Sirer, which began in academia, and that they also moved into a co-working space together in Aug. 2019, around the time that the deal was made for him to provide legal services in exchange for token supply. Roche stated:
“Gün [Sirer] … we did a deal, where I agreed to provide legal services in exchange for a certain percentage of the token supply.”
Another video also shows Roche saying that they “used [litigation services] as a strategic instrument to support Ava Labs.”
“I sue half the companies in this space, I know where this market is going, I believe [I am] one of the top 10 [crypto experts] in this world… I’ve seen the insides of every single crypto company,” according to the video.
This is wild. Not sure if this is true, but assuming the videos are not deep fake…
And of course, #binance was a target. We are not even a competitor.
— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) August 28, 2022
Roche said in one video that he “makes sure that the SEC and CFTC have other magnets [Avalanche competitors] to go after,” adding that “litigation can be a tool to competition.”
Ava Labs CEO Emin Gün Sirer vehemently denied the allegations in the article, stating it was “conspiracy theory nonsense” and saying that Ava Labs would “never engage in unlawful, unethical and just plain wrong behavior.”
According to Roche Freedman LLP’s website, Roche employs at least 24 attorneys, with offices situated in New York City, Boston and Miami. Roche attended North Western University School of Law and co-authored “Why Bitcoin is booming” in the Wall Street Journal in Jul. 2017.
Roche Freedman LLP’s was recently involved in a high-profile lawsuit against Solana Labs, Solana Foundation, and Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko on Jul. 1. 2022, claiming that Solana violated U.S. Federal Security laws by offering unregistered securities to U.S. investors.
About two weeks earlier on Jun. 15, Roche Freedman LLP also filed a lawsuit against Binance, claiming that the crypto exchange unlawfully engaged in the sale of UST to investors.
Cointelegraph reached out to Ava Labs for comment, but no immediate response was received.