A Sweden citizen has been extradited to the United Stated from Thailand to trial for charges of securities fraud, money laundering and wire fraud that involved digital currencies such as Bitcoin(BTC)trade.
Brian A. Benczkowski, assistant attorney general of Criminal Divisions of Justice Department in United States, David L. Anderson, attorney in California based in northern district and Kelly R. Jackson, Special Agent in the Criminal investigation sector of the IRS announced this in a press release.
Roger Nils-Jonas Karlsson, 45, was indicted on July 25th this year along with Eastern Metal Securities (EMS), his company. They were charge for being involved in a scheme to gain over $11 million in various cryptocurrencies by defrauding victims. The arrest was made on June 17th where Karlsson was taken into custody by Thailand’s authorities.
Victims Were Urged to Invest Cryptocurrencies in Fake Businesses
Details of the complaint filed on March 4th of this year state that Karlsson had several aliases and had been involved in malicious cases such as using website platforms to showcase fake representations to unsuspecting victims in order to defraud these potential investors in different schemes since September 2006. One such website, Eastern Metal Securities, was registered to a fake person and promoted investments of “Pre Funded Reversed Pension Plan” (PFRPP).
The press release states that Karlsson utilized the platform to attract potential investors to buy shares of a plan for $98 to receive an accumulated payout of 1.15 kg of gold; current rate of 1.15 kg of gold is worth over $45,000. Karlsson further advertised that if the gold was not payed out, the investors would receive at least 97% of the money they had invested. The complaint states that the government failed to see any evidence of account through which Karlsson could have payed out the investors.
The cryptocurrency funds deposited by the victims were transferred to Karlsson’s personal accounts that were connected with real estate in Thailand. The complaint further elaborates how Karlsson made a second website (HCI25) to create multiple other deceitful promotions for potential investors.
He then joined together the investors from HCI25 and investors from PFRPP and deliberately misled both groups to postpone any worries or realization of investors that they would not receive a payout. On one occasion Karlsson reasoned that the payout did not yet transferred because transitioning large sums of money at once could have a negative impact on the global financial systems, no less.
He also fabricated that EMS was working with United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to create a way for a payout. The complaint states that Karlsson manipulated his victims to invest digital currencies such as Bitcoin and he allegedly defrauded over 3,500 victims, extracting over $11 million in cryptocurrency.
