The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) have requested the UK to intervene in the court against against Telegram and their GRAM token. The SEC has requested the High Court of England to force Telegram’s former chief investment advisor John Hyman, to testify. This comes as a result of Hyman refusing to testify in the case over the Telegram firm’s GRAM tokens offering.

Industry news outlet Coindesk reported on Dec. 7 that the SEC’s request was revealed by documents filed by the regulator with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York yesterday.

Debate over GRAM’s regulatory status

The SEC is convinced that Telegram’s GRAM tokens are in fact unregistered securities. According to the SEC, they are looking to obtain Hyman’s testimony because of his involvement in Telegram’s fundraising campaign for their GRAM tokens. Reportedly he has been in communication with more than a dozen investors of Telegram’s Open Network (TON). And recently Telegram CEO Pavel Durov described Hyman as the person who “runs the distribution of GRAM.”

The SEC made a request to the U.K.’s authorities in order for them to issue a Letter of Request for Hyman’s deposition. This step was taken as a result of Hyman being a United Kingdom’s citizen and resident. According to the court filing, SEC attorneys previously contacted Hyman’s counsel. Resulting in Hyman agreed to provide a voluntary deposition in court.

Later Hyman’s counsel reportedly “refused to return multiple phone calls and emails regarding Mr. Hyman’s deposition.” The SEC is also seeking to obtain copies of Hyman’s written communications with Telegram’s leadership and investors, in addition to his testimony. These documents detail his own investment in grams, along with his employment at Telegram.

Actor Jared Leto invested in Telegram’s GRAM token and TON?

The documents being requested also contain email exchanges between Durov and potential Grams token buyers. It was noted that these documents include communications with Kleiner Perkins’ partner Mamoon Hamid. Who was surprisingly introduced to Durov by a person by the name of Jared Leto.

It still remains uncertain whether the person is the well known actor and singer himself. Although many signs point to this as he used an email address on the celebrity’s official domain, jaredleto.com.

