Quick overview

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Five men have pleaded guilty to their involvement in laundering over $36,9 million from victims of a global conspiracy involving cryptocurrency investment scams.

 

Funds were taken from U.S. investors through offshore accounts, shell corporations, and digital asset wallets, deceiving them. California residents Shengsheng He, 39; Jose Somarriba, 55; and Joseph Wong, 33, all pleaded guilty to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).  Yicheng Zhang and Jingliang Su also admitted to misconduct.

According to a DOJ press release issued on June 9, these individuals were part of a criminal network that took money from victims in the United States while posing as cryptocurrency investors.

 Co-conspirators located abroad convinced the targeted individuals to transfer money under the pretense that they were investigators after contact was made.

Nevertheless, the money went into accounts owned by the criminals. Over $36,9 million was transferred from their U.S.-based holdings into an independent account at Deltec Bank, which is registered under the name Axis Digital Limited in the Bahamas. Su joined them as a director after Somarriba, and He co-founded Axis Digital and opened the Deltec account.

Together, they instructed the bank to exchange the pilfered funds for USDT.

The three subsequently transferred the converted money to a wallet controlled by anonymous individuals in Cambodia, who sent it to anonymous individuals operating “scam centers” throughout the area, including one in Sihanoukville. Wong oversaw a network of money launderers in Los Angeles, who established U.S. bank accounts and transferred money overseas.

Zhang and Wong admitted to conspiring to launder money and could spend up to 20 years behind bars. He, Su, and Somarriba all acknowledged conspiring to run an unlicensed money services company, a crime that carries a maximum sentence of five years.