Banksy owner convicted of $7.1 million crypto fraud

Two British men who owned Banksy artworks were jailed on Friday for stealing £5.7 million ($7.1 million) worth of crypto using a fake crypto exchange that mimicked Blockchain.com.

38-year-old Jake Lee and 42-year-old James Heppel used the fake site ‘blockchain.com’ to trick users into entering their login details. With this information, the two gained access to their victim’s crypto and bitcoin wallets and stole their money.

According to the South West Regional Organized Crime Unit, the pair managed to defraud 55 victims in 26 different countries. Police have seized a £60,000 Banksy print, three vehicles, £64,000 worth of cryptocurrency and £551,000 worth of a suitcase full of cash as part of an £835,000 ($1.04 million) seizure.

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Lee was arrested in 2018 on suspicion of money laundering, when police seized £24,000 in cash and three laminated Bitcoin wallet recovery seeds.

Authorities said: “At the same time, our unit had launched an investigation into a cryptocurrency scam reported by a victim from Wiltshire who had £11,000 worth of Bitcoin from his Blockchain wallet.”

“We took over the investigation into Lee and when we analyzed his devices, we determined that he was a central figure involved in a sophisticated domain spoofing scheme and working to identify numerous victims.”

The two pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud and were sentenced last Friday to four years and fifteen months respectively. Lee has been ordered to hand over £1 million to the victims.

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