The US Department of Justice on Monday announced a conviction in a case involving the seizure of $3.36 billion worth of Bitcoin.
In a nutshell: On November 9, 2021, law enforcement seized 50,676.17851897 Bitcoins from the Gainesville, Georgia, home of James Zhong. The haul was valued at around $3.36 billion at time of the seizure (which just happened to be right around Bitcoin’s all-time high). At the time, it was the largest cryptocurrency seizure in the history of the DOJ and remains the department’s second largest financial seizure ever.
The US Department of Justice on Monday announced a conviction in a case involving the seizure of $3.36 billion worth of Bitcoin.
According to authorities, Zhong unlawfully obtained the Bitcoins from former dark web marketplace Silk Road way back in 2012. He allegedly created nine Silk Road accounts („fraud accounts“) designed to conceal his identity then triggered over 140 transactions in rapid succession to trick the site’s withdrawal-processing system into releasing the Bitcoins from its payment system into his accounts.
