American gets 4 years in prison for stealing Bitcoins from Crypto Mixer Helix
A US court has sentenced Gary James Harmon, the brother of the crypto-mixing service Helix operator, to four years and three months in prison, for stealing over 712 bitcoins, which were subject to forfeiture in an ongoing criminal case.
Bitcoins were linked to Helix, an online Bitcoin mix run by Larry Harmon, Gary Harmon’s brother. Gary effectively transferred these Bitcoins, then valued at $4.8 million, using his brother’s credentials to a wallet he controlled to prevent the police from losing them. He then used two Bitcoin mixing services to hide the trail of these Bitcoins before using them to “fund large purchases and other expenses”.
Larry Harmon was arrested in February 2020 for laundering over 350,000 Bitcoin, valued at over $300 million at the time of the transaction, for his clients. Most of these Bitcoins came from darknet marketplaces. Larry pleaded guilty to money laundering charges in August 2021.
At the time of Larry’s arrest, police seized various assets, including a cryptocurrency storage device that contained illegal proceeds generated through the operation of Helix. That’s when Gary stole a portion of those Bitcoins by transferring them to another wallet.
Gary has now agreed to confiscation of cryptocurrencies and other property derived from the fraudulent proceeds. This includes more than 647.41 Bitcoin, 2.14 Ethereum and 17,404,400.64 Dogecoin, which is now valued at more than $20 million due to an increase in the market price.
Breakdown of cryptomixers
Crypto mixers are popular with criminals as they launder cryptocurrencies by eliminating the traces of past transactions. Over the past few years, authorities in the US and other countries have cracked down on several crypto-mixing facilities operating illegally.
Last month, US and German authorities took down ChipMixer, a crypto-mixing service provider that has laundered $3 billion in cryptocurrencies since 2017. The 49-year-old Vietnamese operator of the platform is also charged with money laundering and unlicensed money laundering. – transfer of business, and identity theft, which has a maximum prison term of 40 years.
In 2019, the Dutch Tax Information and Investigation Service (FIOD), together with Europol and the Luxembourg authorities, shut down the cryptocurrency mixing services of Bestmixer.io, which was one of the market leaders at the time. Meanwhile, the UK National Crime Agency proposed regulating crypto mixers last year, but did not share any developments on the matter.
A US court has sentenced Gary James Harmon, the brother of the crypto-mixing service Helix operator, to four years and three months in prison, for stealing over 712 bitcoins, which were subject to forfeiture in an ongoing criminal case.
Bitcoins were linked to Helix, an online Bitcoin mix run by Larry Harmon, Gary Harmon’s brother. Gary effectively transferred these Bitcoins, then valued at $4.8 million, using his brother’s credentials to a wallet he controlled to prevent the police from losing them. He then used two Bitcoin mixing services to hide the trail of these Bitcoins before using them to “fund large purchases and other expenses”.
Larry Harmon was arrested in February 2020 for laundering over 350,000 Bitcoin, valued at over $300 million at the time of the transaction, for his clients. Most of these Bitcoins came from darknet marketplaces. Larry pleaded guilty to money laundering charges in August 2021.
At the time of Larry’s arrest, police seized various assets, including a cryptocurrency storage device that contained illegal proceeds generated through the operation of Helix. That’s when Gary stole a portion of those Bitcoins by transferring them to another wallet.
Gary has now agreed to confiscation of cryptocurrencies and other property derived from the fraudulent proceeds. This includes more than 647.41 Bitcoin, 2.14 Ethereum and 17,404,400.64 Dogecoin, which is now valued at more than $20 million due to an increase in the market price.
Breakdown of cryptomixers
Crypto mixers are popular with criminals as they launder cryptocurrencies by eliminating the traces of past transactions. Over the past few years, authorities in the US and other countries have cracked down on several crypto-mixing facilities operating illegally.
Last month, US and German authorities took down ChipMixer, a crypto-mixing service provider that has laundered $3 billion in cryptocurrencies since 2017. The 49-year-old Vietnamese operator of the platform is also charged with money laundering and unlicensed money laundering. – transfer of business, and identity theft, which has a maximum prison term of 40 years.
In 2019, the Dutch Tax Information and Investigation Service (FIOD), together with Europol and the Luxembourg authorities, shut down the cryptocurrency mixing services of Bestmixer.io, which was one of the market leaders at the time. Meanwhile, the UK National Crime Agency proposed regulating crypto mixers last year, but did not share any developments on the matter.
