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The US government has filed a civil forfeiture action to recover $54 million in ethereum (eth) previously seized from Christopher Castelluzzo.
in a Press release On November 2, 2023, the US Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey announced the filing of a civil forfeiture action to recover $54 million in eth belonging to Christopher Castelluzzo, who is currently serving concurrent federal and state sentences for distribution of drugs. .
Castelluzzo, together with his associates, sold narcotics and drugs trafficked on the darknet between 2010 and 2015. He used around $9,000 from sales in 2014 to purchase 30,000 eth during the ethereum initial public offering (ICO). He later received an additional 30,000 ethereum Classic (ETC) following the ethereum network hard fork in July 2016.
The 30,000 eth purchased with $9,000 has increased in value and is currently worth approximately $54 million.
The US government is also looking to seize other crypto assets, including Cardano (ADA), Solana (SOL), Avalanche (AVAX), Algorand (ALGO), Binance Coin (BNB), Uniswap (UNI), and Polkadot (DOT). Law enforcement moved all seized tokens, including eth, to government-controlled wallets in July 2022 and August 2023.
While Castelluzzo was serving his sentence, the convicted drug trafficker, in a recorded telephone conversation, planned with his associates to evade taxes and move eth to places such as Malta, Ireland and the Bahamas, as recorded in the court file.
“Our $54 million forfeiture action should serve as a lesson to those who mistakenly believe we cannot trace their unlawful behavior or ill-gotten gains. “We managed to openly hold all criminals accountable, with real-world consequences.”
James E. Dennehy, Special Agent in Charge of FBI-Newark
As previously reported, the US government holds around 200,000 btc in hardware wallets, making it one of the largest asset holders, and the majority of bitcoin confiscated from criminals.
