- DoJ charges the duo with money laundering and defrauding the United States.
- Special agents were granted a warrant to inspect files.
A 31-year-old New Yorker, Heather Morgan claims to be a serial entrepreneur, prolific writer, irreverent humorous rapper, and investor in B2B software firms with solid growth potential. Morgan and her husband, Ilya Lichtenstein, were detained this morning by FBI agents for allegedly trying to launder crypto linked to the 2016 Bitfinex hack, which resulted in the theft of 119,756 Bitcoin (BTC).
In a New York court appearance on Tuesday, they asserted their innocence and were released on multi-million dollar bonds. More than five years after the theft of 119,756 BTC from Bitfinex, the value of the stolen currency has risen from $72 million to over $5 billion. Small amounts of BTC have been transferred in different transactions after the 2016 breach, leaving most of the assets undisturbed.
Typical Tech Entrepreneur
The DoJ tracked this money back to Lichtenstein and Morgan, which said that 25,000 BTC had been transferred to their accounts. In order to access and collect more than 94,000 BTC (worth $3.6 billion) from Morgan and Lichtenstein, special agents were granted a warrant to inspect files, including private keys to the wallet, which enabled them to confiscate the funds.
DoJ charges the duo with money laundering and defrauding the United States, although they are not accused of actually hacking into the system. It’s possible to get up to 20 years in prison for the first offense and up to five years for the second. One may discover Morgan’s TikTok videos showing artworks inspired by her Synesthesia and her “Weird AF” music videos on social media. Lichtenstein looks to be a typical tech entrepreneur.
