The Hashflare co -founders, a scheme of cryptographic mining ponzi that stole $ 577 million hundreds of thousands of investors worldwide, both declared themselves guilty on Wednesday of conspiracy to commit electronic fraud.
Sergei Potapenko and Ivan Turõgin, both 40, were arrested in their hometown in November 2022 and extradited to the United States in an accusation of 18 positions. Yesterday, both men declared themselves guilty of a conspiracy charge to commit electronic fraud, which entails a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
Between 2015 and 2019, Potapenko and Turõgin convinced Hashflare investors to rent a percentage of mining cryptography operations of the scheme in exchange for a percentage of the hashflare of cryptocurrencies produced. But, according to judicial documents, Hashflare only had a small fraction of the mining team that supposedly had, less than 1% of the computer power that Potapeno and Turõgin had sold. When investors tried to claim their income, prosecutors say that the two men resisted making payments making excuses or returning the cryptography bought in the open market.
Read more: two stages in charge of executing a series of cryptography scams for a total of $ 575 million
Potapeko and Turõgin’s lawyers say that none of Hashflare’s investors suffered financial damage, telling Coindesk that the only crime of men was lying on the size of Hashflare’s mining operation.
“Ivan and Sergei directed successful businesses, providing real services, using almost 100 stages and carrying out charity in Estonia. As Ivan admitted [Wednesday]One of his business and Sergei promised to extract cryptography and, in fact, extracted cryptography, but not as much as promised; Instead, he sometimes paid customers with crypto he had bought in the open market, ”said Andrey Spektor, a partner of Norton Rose Fulbright Us LLP and Turogin Advisor.
“It is important to note that, as we will show in the sentence, no client has suffered any damage. Ivan and Sergei hope to return to Estonia and resume their lives. “
According to judicial documents, men used their victim’s money to make dozens of real estate investments and buy luxury cars. As part of the guilt agreement, Potapeko and Turõgin agreed to lose assets valued for more than $ 400 million, which will be used to pay investors.
Potapeko and Turõgin will be sentenced in a Seattle Court on May 8.
