-
With the return of these BTC, the amount that would be allocated to the reserve planned by Trump decreases.
-
Once delivery takes place, the US will have less bitcoin than China.
The United States government must return to Bitfinex almost 80% of the bitcoins that were confiscated in the framework of the hack perpetrated against the exchange in 2016. The decision, presented in a document published this January 16 by a Court of the District of Columbia , approves the motion presented by a group of prosecutors.
In accordance with the court’s ruling, the Department of Justice You will have to return about 94,636 bitcoin recovered after the attack on the platform, which is currently equivalent to USD 9 billion. These are the BTC that were confiscated from Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather Morgan, responsible for the hack who were arrested and charged with conspiracy to launder money.
Specifically, US prosecutors asked the judge to authorize the return of much of the 119,754 bitcoin stolen. This, considering that there are no «victims» for the specific crimes of conviction in this procedure, as established by the Mandatory Victim Restitution Law. Which means that for the court there is no need to make refunds to platform users.
However, third parties are permitted to file claims for recovered assets through an “ancillary procedure.” This, as long as they can prove ownership. But these plaintiffs would not be considered victims under the legal framework of the case.
It should be remembered that Bitfinex clients were compensated through BFX tokens or shares of the exchange’s parent company, allowing many to recover their losses.
As NoticiasVE reported, last November, the person responsible for this computer attack, Ilya Lichtenstein, was sentenced to five years in prison for money laundering related to the hack.
The defendant used advanced hacking techniques to carry out more than 2,000 fraudulent transactions, transferring the bitcoins to a wallet under your control. He later enlisted the help of his wife, Heather Morgan, to launder the funds. Morgan received an 18-month prison sentence.
Following the Court’s decision, the return of the remaining 25,000 BTC is pending. In any case, when this delivery is completed the amount of bitcoin will decrease that are currently in the hands of the United States, estimated to be almost 200,000 coins. With this figure, the northern country heads the list of nations converted into whales, followed by China. Although with the return, the Asian country would become the nation with the most bitcoins in the world.