{"id":1731265,"date":"2022-11-09T06:13:01","date_gmt":"2022-11-09T11:13:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1731265"},"modified":"2022-11-09T06:17:54","modified_gmt":"2022-11-09T11:17:54","slug":"feds-say-theyve-seized-50000-stolen-bitcoins-stored-in-a-popcorn-tin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/feds-say-theyve-seized-50000-stolen-bitcoins-stored-in-a-popcorn-tin\/","title":{"rendered":"Feds Say They&#8217;ve Seized 50,000 Stolen Bitcoins Stored in a Popcorn Tin"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">24<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Ffeds-say-theyve-seized-50000-stolen-bitcoins-stored-in-a-popcorn-tin%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1731265&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/11\/GettyImages-1336750482.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p>After a decade of hunting, the Justice Department has made its second-largest-ever seizure of cryptocurrency, confiscating more than 51,680 Bitcoin.<\/p>\n<div class=\"paywall\">\n<p>The digital tokens were previously held by James Zhong, who has pled guilty to stealing them from <a href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/crypto\/2022\/10\/20\/silk-road-sleuths-launch-naxo-a-firm-dedicated-to-the-cutting-edge-of-crypto-tracking\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"sc-bdvvtL lpozya\">the Silk Road<\/a>, a once infamous dark web site that was known as the \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/company\/amazon-com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"sc-bdvvtL lpozya\">Amazon<\/a> of drugs\u201d for its access to illegal drugs, weapons, and services. While there\u2019s no love lost between law enforcement officials and that site, Zhong\u2019s theft of the Bitcoin was no less criminal.<\/p>\n<p>Officials found the Bitcoin after serving a search warrant on Zhong\u2019s home in Gainesville, Ga. A \u201csingle board computer\u201d was found hidden in a popcorn tin in a bathroom closet that held the digital tokens.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cJames Zhong committed wire fraud over a decade ago when he stole approximately 50,000 Bitcoin from Silk Road,\u201d said U.S. attorney Damian Williams <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/usao-sdny\/pr\/us-attorney-announces-historic-336-billion-cryptocurrency-seizure-and-conviction\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"sc-bdvvtL lpozya\">in a statement<\/a> this week. \u201cFor almost 10 years, the whereabouts of this massive chunk of missing Bitcoin had ballooned into an over $3.3 billion mystery.\u00a0 Thanks to state-of-the-art cryptocurrency tracing and good old-fashioned police work, law enforcement located and recovered this impressive cache of crime proceeds.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>About that dollar figure: The Bitcoin were seized on Nov. 9, 2021, Justice Department officials say. At the time, it was worth $3.36 billion. Bitcoin, though, has <a href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/crypto\/2022\/09\/08\/what-happens-if-bitcoin-falls-below-10000\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"sc-bdvvtL lpozya\">dropped precipitously<\/a> since then, and as of Tuesday morning, the Bitcoin seized was worth just over $1 billion.<\/p>\n<p>The Justice Department in 2017 <a href=\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/2017\/10\/02\/bitcoin-sale-silk-road\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"sc-bdvvtL lpozya\">sold off<\/a> other Bitcoin taken directly from the Silk Road for just over $48 million.<\/p>\n<p>Justice Department officials say Zhong registered nine fake accounts on the Silk Road in September 2012, depositing between 200 and 2,000 Bitcoin into the account. He would then flood the site with withdrawal requests (as many as five per second), which tricked the site into giving him multiples of what he had deposited. After doing this 140 times, he had withdrawn all of the site\u2019s cryptocurrency holdings.<\/p>\n<p>Zhong also forfeited $662,000 in cash, physical Bitcoin coins, an 80% interest in a Memphis-based real estate investment company with substantial holdings, and more.<\/p>\n<p>He\u2019s facing up to 20 years in prison.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"sc-hYQoXb gYzAO article\">\n<p>Sign up for the\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/mynewsletters.fortune.com\/fortune-features\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"sc-bdvvtL lpozya\">Fortune Features<\/a><\/em> email list so you don\u2019t miss our biggest features, exclusive interviews, and investigations.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After a decade of hunting, the Justice Department has made its second-largest-ever seizure of cryptocurrency, confiscating more than 51,680 Bitcoin. The digital tokens were previously held by James Zhong, who<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1731268,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[547],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1731265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bongino-report"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1731265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1731265"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1731265\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1731268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1731265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1731265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1731265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}