The U.S. Department of Justice has closed its criminal investigation into Kraken founder and former CEO Jesse Powell and the FBI has returned dozens of laptops, phones, and other devices seized in a 2023 raid on his home. According to court filings reported by Fortune, prosecutors issued a formal declination letter confirming that no charges will be brought, ending a probe that had run for roughly two years. The investigation was handled by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California and involved FBI agents. The case did not concern Kraken’s exchange operations or broader crypto-market conduct, but instead arose from a governance dispute at Verge Center for the Arts, a Sacramento/San Francisco-area nonprofit Powell founded in 2008. Verge board members had accused Powell of “hacking and cyber-stalking” the organization by allegedly interfering with access to its email, Slack, and Google Workspace accounts after he was pushed off the board, allegations that led to the raid and device seizures. Powell denies hacking or blocking access and has filed a civil lawsuit in state court accusing former colleagues of defamation and wrongful removal, claiming Verge insiders secretly created a new domain and parallel accounts as part of a plan to oust him. The declination letter and return of devices are important both for Powell’s personal reputation and for Kraken’s regulatory posture: his legal team sought written confirmation to reassure banks and regulators that Kraken’s leadership is not under active federal criminal scrutiny. The filings also state that the returned hardware contains Verge-related data that Powell argues support his version of events, though neither the DOJ nor FBI has commented publicly on the decision to close the case or on how details of the original raid reached the New York Times. Separate from this matter, Kraken has faced its own regulatory actions, including prior SEC scrutiny, but those are distinct from the Verge dispute and the now-closed FBI/DOJ probe into Powell personally. The end of the investigation removes a significant overhang for one of the industry’s longest-standing exchange founders at a time when U.S. authorities remain active in crypto enforcement more broadly.

AI-generated background, compiled from web sources — not editorial content.

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