Tigran Gambaryan, head of financial crime compliance at Binance Holdings Ltd. Image: David Exodus/Bloomberg

Nigerian court rejects Binance executive ill health bail plea

Binance’s head of financial-crime compliance has been detained in the country since February.

11 Oct 2024, 11:15 by Nduka Orjinmo, Bloomberg · Moneyweb

A Nigerian court on Friday rejected a bail application on health grounds for a Binance Holdings Ltd. executive standing trial on allegations of money laundering and currency manipulation, while instructing the prison to refer him to hospital for treatment.

Tigran Gambaryan, the head of financial-crime compliance at Binance whom US lawmakers say has been unjustly detained, has been held in the country since February. His lawyer has repeatedly raised his poor state of health and said that it requires surgery.

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Justice Emeka Nwite of the Federal High Court in the capital, Abuja, denied the bail application, noting that a person being ill “does not entitle them to leave custody, unless the continuous stay of the detainee possesses a harm to others and quarantine isn’t available.”

Gambaryan’s lawyer, Mark Mordi, had pleaded that his client be granted bail to allow him to seek medical help for a herniated disk that was making walking difficult for him.

Gambaryan arrived at the court in a wheelchair, where he remained for the hearing.

“I am not surprised by this decision,” his wife Yuki Gambaryan said in a statement. “It is completely unjust to deny someone in Tigran’s condition the opportunity to seek appropriate medical help.”

The face-off between Africa’s most populous nation and the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange burst into public view in February, when Nigerian authorities detained Gambaryan and a colleague – who subsequently managed to escape – during a visit to Nigeria.

Gambaryan has been held in the Kuje correctional center in the capital Abuja since early April.

Binance took to social media to advocate for his release and upped the stakes when Chief Executive Officer Richard Teng claimed in a blog that its team was asked for a “secret” payment to make its problems go away while they were in Abuja in January.

Nigeria rejects the allegation, which it called a tactic to divert attention away from Binance’s activities.

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