Lichtenstein and Morgan were arrested on Tuesday for allegedly conspiring to launder nearly 120,000 bitcoins, amounting to $4.5 billion at the current exchange rate, stolen from the crypto exchange Bitfinex during a hacking attack in 2016. According to the media, at a hearing on Wednesday, a federal court ruled that the couple can leave jail on $8 million bail, including $5 million for Lichtenstein and $3 million for Morgan.
The New York couple arrested for allegedly laundering $4.5 billion worth of stolen bitcoins.
The criminal case alleges that Lichtenstein and Morgan used numerous sophisticated methods to launder money stolen after the hacking attack on the Bitfinex platform, including using false identities to create Internet accounts, running computer programs to automate transactions, and depositing stolen funds on various virtual currency exchanges and darknet markets, among others. Lichtenstein and Morgan were charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to defraud the United States, which carry a maximum sentence of 20 years and five years in prison, respectively.
25,000 of stolen Bitcoins in the last five years were transferred out of Lichtenstein’s wallet.
As reported earlier, nearly 25,000 of the stolen Bitcoins in the last five years were transferred out of Lichtenstein’s wallet via a lengthy and complicated laundering process that ended with some of the stolen funds being deposited into financial accounts controlled by Lichtenstein and Morgan. The remainder of the stolen funds, which make up more than 94,000 Bitcoin, remained in the wallet used to receive and store the illegal proceeds from the hack. “We’re pleased that DOJ has recovered a significant portion of the bitcoin stolen during the 2016 hack,” Bitfinex said.
