NFT Co-Founder Faces Lawsuit Over Crypto Wallet Dispute
The world of nonfungible tokens (NFTs) has been rocked by a lawsuit that has been filed against one of the co-founders of the Rebase project, Edmond Truong. The lawsuit has been brought by Krzysztof Gagacki, who claims to be a co-founder of the project and alleges that Truong has acted in bad faith by misappropriating $2 million into a separate wallet that is owned and controlled by him without Gagacki's consent.
In the filing, which was made on April 17, 2023, in a United States District Court in California, Gagacki accuses Truong of eight separate complaints, including breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, defamation, and trademark infringement. He is demanding a jury trial, claiming that Truong has "gone rogue" by stealing money from a joint crypto wallet and ousting Gagacki from the firm.
According to Gagacki, the professional relationship between the two had deteriorated by October 27, 2022, when Truong breached their partnership contract. Gagacki claims that he owns a 50% share of the funds in the joint crypto wallet but that Truong refuses to provide him with the private keys to the digital wallet.
Gagacki further alleges that Truong has "ousted" him from the business by presenting himself as the "sole owner" and "decision maker" for Rebase. He claims that Truong has made several defamatory statements to the firm's business contacts about him, causing damage to his reputation.
Furthermore, Gagacki claims that Truong has intentionally interfered with several prospective deals that he had been working on for the firm. One of these deals involved American celebrity Bella Hadid, who featured in the firm's Cy-B3lla NFT project. The filing alleges that Hadid refused further collaboration with the project after it was made apparent to her that the two co-founders had clashed.
It is unclear when the professional relationship between Truong and Gagacki started to deteriorate, but Gagacki claims that Truong has been acting in bad faith by misappropriating funds and making defamatory statements about him. The lawsuit is expected to be closely watched by the NFT community, which has seen explosive growth in recent years. As the use of NFTs continues to expand into different industries, legal disputes like this one could become more common.