1 year ago
The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced the indictment of 4 individuals implicated successful a blase cognition to launder millions of dollars defrauded from victims done cryptocurrency concern scams, according to a Dec. 14 press release.
The defendants — Lu Zhang, Justin Walker, Joseph Wong, and Hailong Zhu — look aggregate charges, including conspiracy to perpetrate wealth laundering and planetary wealth laundering.
“Pig butchers”
Investigators allege that the radical conspired to make ammunition companies and slope accounts for funneling proceeds from “pig butchering” scams. The word alludes to the signifier of fattening hogs earlier slaughter.
The strategy involves gathering spot with victims met connected societal media oregon dating services, with the eventual extremity of coaxing them into making cryptocurrency investments connected sham platforms.
The indictment reports astatine slightest 284 transactions, resulting successful implicit $80 cardinal successful losses, with much than $20 cardinal straight linked to accounts tied to the accused.
Zhang and Walker were apprehended and appeared successful national tribunal connected Dec. 14. The 2 look up to 20 years successful situation if recovered guilty.
The DOJ has not yet released accusation regarding the apprehension presumption of the remaining 2 defendants, Joseph Wong and Hailong Zhu.
NCET
The lawsuit reflects the DOJ’s increasing absorption connected cryptocurrency-related crimes, spearheaded by the Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section’s (CCIPS) National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team (NCET).
NCET’s relation is progressively captious successful tracing and prosecuting integer plus crimes, moving intimately with different authorities and backstage assemblage entities.
The U.S. Secret Service’s Global Investigative Operations Center is starring the ongoing investigation, with the lawsuit being jointly prosecuted by the Central District of California’s U.S. Attorney’s Office and CCIPS/NCET.
As always, it is important to retrieve that an indictment is not a condemnation nether U.S. instrumentality and that each defendants are presumed guiltless until proven blameworthy beyond a tenable uncertainty successful a tribunal of law.
The station DOJ targets cryptocurrency scammers successful $80 cardinal ‘pig butchering’ scheme appeared archetypal connected CryptoSlate.
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