Damian Williams, the highest federal prosecutor in Manhattan, speaks at a press convention to announce the addition of “Cryptoqueen” Ruja Ignatova to the FBI’s most-wanted fugitives record, in New York, June 30, 2022.
Luc Cohen | Reuters
The co-founder of the fraudulent OneCoin cryptocurrency, an enormous pyramid scheme that amassed greater than $4 billion from hundreds of thousands of buyers worldwide, was sentenced Tuesday to twenty years in jail.
Karl Greenwood, 46, who orchestrated the multibillion-dollar multilevel advertising and marketing con, pleaded responsible in December to wire fraud and cash laundering fees.
His accomplice, Ruja Ignatova, 43, often known as the “Cryptoqueen” on the FBI’s High 10 Most Needed record, stays at giant, the U.S. Division of Justice mentioned.
Greenwood “operated one of many largest fraud schemes ever perpetrated,” U.S. Lawyer Damian Williams mentioned in a press launch.
“We hope this prolonged sentence resonates within the monetary sector and deters anybody who could also be tempted to mislead buyers and exploit the cryptocurrency ecosystem via fraud,” Williams mentioned.
Greenwood’s sentence was imposed by federal Choose Edgardo Ramos in U.S. District Courtroom in decrease Manhattan.
OneCoin, which started in Bulgaria in 2014, took in additional than $4 billion from no less than 3.5 million folks between 2014 and 2016, the DOJ mentioned. The scheme was marketed and offered via a multilevel advertising and marketing construction, which paid fee to OneCoin members who recruited others to purchase crypto packages.
Greenwood, the highest distributor, acquired 5% of all OneCoin gross sales, raking in additional than $300 million in complete, the DOJ mentioned.
Each Greenwood and Ignatova persistently portrayed OneCoin as being the following Bitcoin-like crypto funding alternative. However “not like authentic cryptocurrencies, OneCoin had no precise worth and was conceived of by Greenwood and Ignatova as a fraud from day one,” the DOJ mentioned.
The co-founders and others lied repeatedly to their buyers, together with by claiming that OneCoin’s worth was decided by market forces when, in actuality, its value was set “arbitrarily,” authorities mentioned.
Ignatova was charged in October 2017 on counts associated to fraud and cash laundering. Days after a federal warrant was issued for her arrest, Ignatova flew from Bulgaria to Athens, Greece.
She “has not been seen publicly since,” the DOJ mentioned.
The FBI is providing a reward of as much as $250,000 for data resulting in Ignatova’s arrest, in line with her web page on the company’s High 10 Most Needed Fugitives record.
Her needed poster says that she is “believed to journey with armed guards and/or associates,” and “could have had cosmetic surgery or in any other case altered her look.”
