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US lawyers are announced The Justice Department has officially seized $3.36 billion worth of bitcoin at the time of diversion in connection with the 2012 Silk Road fraud. is.
A press release issued on November 7 stated that more than 50,676 bitcoins hidden in defendant JAMES ZHONGs home devices were taken into custody following Zhongs conviction at the November 4 trial. It is stated. The history of the US Department of Justice, but the DOJ’s most significant financial seizure to date.
The news is that Zhong pleaded guilty on November 4 to a fraud charge of “conducting wire fraud, illegally obtaining over 50,000 bitcoins from Silk Road dark web Internet marketplaces in September 2012.” It was done in parallel with the exposure.
U.S. Attorney Damien Williams said:
James Zhong committed a wire transfer scam when he stole about 50,000 bitcoins from Silk Road over a decade ago. The mystery swelled to more than a dollar, and thanks to state-of-the-art cryptocurrency tracking and good old-fashioned policing, law enforcement managed to locate and recover this impressive cache of criminal proceeds.
Williams confirmed that some of the bitcoin was hidden in a “circuit board at the bottom of a popcorn can,” according to a release showing that Zhong hid the cryptocurrency in such a way.
US government generally The bulk sale of seized cryptocurrencies means that over 50,000 BTC could hit the market in the coming weeks and months. It’s unclear if Bitcoin’s latest cash will be auctioned off, but it’s common practice in the US legal system to do so.
The lawsuit against Zhong alleges that he created several accounts on the Silk Road marketplace before “triggering more than 140 transactions in quick succession to trick Silk Road’s withdrawal processing system into releasing approximately 50,000 bitcoins.” It is said that
Zhong received the same amount in Bitcoin Cash following Bitcoin’s hard fork in 2017, which he also converted to Bitcoin.
Following Zhong’s guilty plea on November 4, the judge “issued a consent preliminary order for forfeiture with respect to certain property and alternative assets/monetary judgments confiscating ZHONG’s ownership along with other assets.”
IRS agents recovered over 50,000 bitcoins from Zhong’s Georgia home in November 2021. Zhong also delivered additional bitcoin by his June of this year. The first bitcoin was recovered from his computer in a basement vault and a single board in a can of popcorn.
Zhong faces up to 20 years in prison for this crime.
Updated Nov 7 at 6:37pm to correct the value of the seized bitcoin to the current value instead of the DOJ reported value.
