Two jailed after £5,500,000,000,000 Bitcoin fraud case

Two people who laundered over £5.5billion worth of Bitcoin have been jailed for a total of 15 years.

Malaysian national Hok Seng Ling, 47, pleaded guilty at London’s Southwark Crown Court to entering into a money laundering arrangement.

His accomplice, Chinese national Zhimin Qian, 47, also admitted to money laundering, which gave her the title ‘Goddess of Wealth’, due to her lavish lifestyle.

Both appeared in Southwark Crown Court. Qian was sentenced to 11 years and eight months. Ling was sentenced to four years and 11 months.

Qian fled China with false documents before entering the UK and laundering money through property purchases, the Metropolitan Police said.

Together, the pair defrauded more than 128,000 victims through a scheme in China between 2014 and 2017.

Ling had reportedly been dealing in cryptocurrency on behalf of Qian, ‘knowing or suspecting his actions would facilitate the acquisition or control of criminal property by another’.

They then stored the illegally obtained funds in Bitcoin assets, according to police.

Another one of the pair’s accomplices, Jian Wen, was earlier jailed for six years and eight months after being found with Bitcoin wallets worth billions.

Police in London made the largest ever cryptocurrency seizure in history, taking billions of pounds worth of bitcoin from the three people.

Qian used the money to purchase a multi-million-pound property in North London, along with two lavish properties in Dubai.

Will Lyne, The Met’s Head of Economic and Cybercrime Command, said: ‘These two guilty pleas mark the culmination of years of dedicated investigation by the Met’s Economic Crime teams and our partners.

‘This is one of the largest money laundering cases in UK history and among the highest-value cryptocurrency cases globally. Through a meticulous investigation and unprecedented cooperation with Chinese law enforcement, we were able to obtain compelling evidence of the criminal origins of the cryptoassets the pair attempted to launder in the UK.

‘My thoughts are with the thousands of victims defrauded in this scheme, and I hope this outcome acknowledges the harm these defendants inflicted and reinforces the Met’s unwavering commitment to justice.’

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