The ex-boyfriend of Ruja Ignatova, the mastermind behind the Onecoin pyramid, received five years in prison. Sentenced for laundering hundreds of millions of dollars from a notorious crypto scam that scammed investors around the world.
Ruja’s ex-boyfriend convicted of Onecoin-related money laundering
Gilbert Armenta, ex-boyfriend of Onecoin crypto-pyramid founder Ruja Ignatova, convicted in US, Bloomberg Law reported. According to court documents, he helped launder $300 million in proceeds from one of the largest Ponzi schemes in the history of cryptocurrencies.
In 2018, Armenta, now 59, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud, money laundering and extortion, all in connection with Onecoin. For about two years, he cooperated with the prosecutor’s office in investigating the scam, but later committed other crimes, violating the agreement.
Founded in 2014, Onecoin operated as a global multi-level marketing network based on a cryptocurrency that never really existed as such, despite being touted as a “bitcoin killer”. According to Onecoin’s own documents, over 3 million people have invested more than $4 billion in Onecoin since 2016.
Bulgarian-born German citizen Ruja Ignatova disappeared in October 2017 when she boarded a Ryanair flight in Sofia bound for Athens. However, at large she is wanted by Interpol, Europol and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
Her brother and co-founder Konstantin, who was detained in Los Angeles in 2019, pleaded guilty to Onecoin-related charges and applied for witness protection in the United States. In December 2022, another co-founder, British and Swedish citizen Carl Sebastian Greenwood, also pleaded guilty to involvement in the scam.
The inspirer of the cryptopyramid Ruja Ignatova has not yet been found
Information about the whereabouts and activities of Ignatova periodically surfaced in the media. Last July, the leading Greek daily newspaper Kathimerini reported that the Greek police were trying to find and arrest her, acting on intelligence evidence indicating she was in the country, and holding meetings with unknown individuals.
In January of this year, British media discovered that a $15 million apartment, bought by the “missing cryptocurrency queen” through a Guernsey-based company, was up for sale. BBC report on the matter disclosed that the Kensington penthouse was listed with the approval of the German authorities.
The prosecutor’s office in the city of Bielefeld accused German lawyer Martin Breidenbach, who worked for Ignatova, of laundering money to transfer 20 million euros (over $21 million) to buy a four-room apartment. In October, he appeared in court along with two Onecoin employees on charges of fraud and other crimes.
Do you think law enforcement will eventually find Onecoin founder Ruja Ignatova? Share your thoughts on this case in the comments section below.
Credit : news.bitcoin.com
