XRP Lawsuit: Telephonic hearing scheduled in the DPP Dispute

The latest update in the XRP lawsuit saw the court order a telephone conference to discuss the Defendants’ pending motion to compel the SEC to produce certain documents it designated as privileged. The hearing is scheduled for Tuesday, August 31, 2021, with a public dial-in number that is to be posted before the conference.

The telephonic conference order was followed by the Parties’ joint request for a brief extension of the fact discovery deadline to take Garlinghouse and Larsen depositions. Furthermore, it also pled to extend the expert discovery deadline until November 12, 2021.

Pending & Extended Discovery Dispute

The extensions for discovery deadlines could point at parties’ further efforts at making their end of the arguments stronger by using the information produced during the conference. Coingape’s former coverage has highlighted both parties’ unwillingness to produce compelled documents. The only time they appear to have an agreement is when they are seeking extensions to make their opposition stronger in discovery disputes. With increasing pending motions and one after another extension, the XRP lawsuit may be heading towards a longer run than expected.

“Garlinghouse’s and Larsen’s motions to dismiss are pending before the Court, the parties are still conducting fact discovery, two motions to compel are pending before Magistrate Judge Netburn, and the parties are requesting leave to conduct two depositions in September.” Additionally, two more motions, the motion to strike and the motion to intervene remain pending.

Ripple’s response in DPP Dispute

In a recent update, the XRP lawsuit saw the defense argue against SEC’s constant efforts at re-litigating the irrelevance of DPP dispute documents that are already marked relevant by the court.

Ripple emphasized SEC’s consecutive failures at producing the repeatedly compelled data. Furthermore, Ripple’s counsel speculates that SEC’s constant attempts to argue the reliability of DPP’s blanket application raises more suspicions.

Hinman deposition in DPP Dispute

Before Ripple’s response, the SEC argued that Ripple had stroked the most probative evidence, i.e., former SEC Division of Corporation Finance Director, William Hinman’s deposition testimony that he met with Ripple representatives. Hinman asserted that in this meeting, he alerted Ripple against unregistered sales of XRP by defining them as sales of securities.

However, in its response, Ripple claimed that the plaintiff “mischaracterizes” Hinman’s deposition testimony. Ripple argued that Hinman’s response about XRP’s security status was removed instead of its duplicative nature. Moreover, that part of Hinman’s deposition didn’t include a relevant answer to the asked question.