Justice of the Peace Sarah Netburn ordered SEC send Ripple an email with a draft speech by the former director of corporate finance for the regulator, William Hinman, in which he stated that Ethereum is not a security. This was announced by lawyer James Filan.
Entry 1express the notetakers’ own thinking or reflect deliberations or communications among SEC staff, the SEC may seek leave for limited
redactions. Defendants’ motion is otherwise DENIED.https://t.co/XALwb3CXmQ— James K. Filan 🇺🇸🇮🇪 (@FilanLaw) January 13, 2022
This is about speech Hinman at the Yahoo Finance conference in June 2018. Then the former official said that for various reasons, Bitcoin and Ethereum are not securities. He did not mention the XRP token.
For the past few months, the SEC and Ripple have been arguing about what information should be disclosed as part of the lawsuit. Lawyers for the fintech company demanded a series of documents, including internal SEC communications on the content of speeches and other public communications.
Commission officials insisted that these documents were subject to the privileges of the deliberative process (deliberative process privilege, DPP). This is a principle of law that allows the regulator to refuse to disclose papers or testify, citing the confidentiality of data and sources.
In her ruling, Netburn agreed that certain documents are indeed protected by the DPP. However, this principle cannot be applied to other recordings, in particular, to an email with Hinman’s speech.
“If the personal views of agency employees do not influence the “formulation or exercise of politically oriented judgments,” they are not protected by the DPP. Accordingly, emails relating to speeches or drafts do not precede decisions and are not deliberative documents that are subject to protection, ”the judge ruled.
Netburn also ordered the SEC to provide Ripple with certain records of meetings between agency employees and third parties. For example, the company will have access to a transcript of a meeting between officials and ConsenSys in 2016.
The Documents In Boxes Framed in Green Must Be Turned Overhttps://t.co/tF0q3zN1f0
— James K. Filan 🇺🇸🇮🇪 (@FilanLaw) January 13, 2022
Earlier, Deaton Law Firm founder John Deaton noted that in 2017, Hinman and ConsenSys CEO Joseph Lubin had a meeting that “was not about the Ethereum ICO,” but was “the start of a very mutually beneficial ‘alliance’.”
However, the regulator is not required to disclose documents related to the legal analysis of XRP. The Commission also has the right to refuse to disclose records of employee meetings with Ripple representatives and interdepartmental discussions.
In December, human rights non-profit organization Empower Oversight demanded that the SEC disclose documents relating to a potential conflict of interest in the actions of former high-ranking officials.
Recall that the head of Ripple Brad Garlinghouse allowed a successful resolution of the dispute with the SEC in 2022.
