A group of fraud victims who lost money to an email compromise scheme now stand to benefit from the run-up in Bitcoin prices.<\/p>\n
On Monday, the U.S. attorney’s office for the Western District of Washington said the victims of a December 2023 fraud scheme who lost millions of dollars are likely to be made whole after the U.S. Secret Service and the asset forfeiture unit of the U.S. attorney\u2019s office traced their money \u2014 which was laundered through multiple bank accounts and ultimately converted into crypto held by fraudsters in Nigeria \u2014 and seized the 32.68 Bitcoin from the fraudsters\u2019 cryptocurrency wallet.<\/p>\n
At the time, the Bitcoin seized by U.S. authorities was worth about US$900,000, but its value has since more than tripled to around US$3.3 million, a release said.<\/p>\n
As a result, the victims of the scheme who filed claims in a civil forfeiture case may now get all of their money back, the U.S. attorney’s office noted.<\/p>\n
\u201cI commend the quick work by law enforcement and the asset forfeiture unit who moved to seize this Bitcoin and are working diligently to make these victims whole,\u201d U.S. Attorney Tessa Gorman said in the release.<\/p>\n
\u201cCivil forfeiture is an important tool that we can use to help victims, even before the bad actors themselves have been arrested.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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