Apr 29, 2023 12:56 PM | | Read in 2 minutes
on thursday Gary Harmonan Ohio resident was sentenced to four years in prison after pleading guilty to stealing over 712 in January Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) from a computer seized by the federal government.
according to release From the Department of Justice, Harmon must also give up “certain properties,” including crypto assets valued at more than $20 million.
In April 2020, Harmon recovered 713 bitcoins using his brother Larry Harmon’s credentials. Larry Harmon was stored on a device that was used as part of a darknet-based cryptocurrency money laundering service. Bitcoin was worth about $4.9 million at the time.
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Larry Harmon was indicted in February 2020 for laundering $300 million worth of Bitcoin by operating the Darknet-based service Helix.he petition Guilty after 18 months.
Also read: Man gets jail sentence after federal government finds $3.4 billion in stolen Bitcoin hidden inside Cheetos popcorn cans
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Court filings reveal that prosecutors and Gary Harmon’s lawyers disagreed over the degree of sophistication needed to make the theft successful.
Gary Harmon’s attorney wrote, “While the practice is certainly illegal, it’s no more substantive and sophisticated than obtaining the keys to a safe deposit box and removing its contents.” bloomberg.
The prosecutor countered by writing:[while] Physical world analogies are often inadequate when describing cyber incidents, and the defendant’s actions involve the use of powerful tools to silently tunnel from neighboring buildings into bank vaults and to harass law enforcement agencies. is similar to siphoning all the funds while trying to unlock the front door of a bank in vain. door. ”
Prosecutors said Gary Harmon used 68 bitcoins as collateral for a $1.2 million loan and spent some to buy a luxury condo in Cleveland. I found a photo of him in a nightclub bathtub full of bills.
According to the agency, 712 BTC is worth just under $21 million at current prices.
READ NEXT: Anthony Scaramucci Says He’s More Bullish On Bitcoin Than Ever: “An Incredibly Robust And Strangely Unbreakable Asset Class”
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