Approximately $7.1 million in cryptocurrency tied to a fraudulent oil and gas investment scheme is in tow of the U.S. government, as the Department of Justice announced on Tuesday.
This civil forfeiture action, spearheaded by the Seattle U.S. Attorney’s Office, focuses on the digital assets that were allegedly obtained through a scam that defrauded victims of tens of millions of dollars from June 2022 to July 2024.
Acting U.S. Attorney Teal Luthy Miller stated the scam’s operators used numerous cryptocurrency accounts to disguise the origins of the money that had been funneled from donors.
“The co-schemers in this fraud moved their ill-gotten gain through various cryptocurrency accounts to try to launder the money stolen from victims,” Miller stated.
The prosecutors claimed that the money was traced to individuals in Russia and Nigeria. These individuals had been using stolen funds to buy cryptocurrency and, later on, part of those assets were moved to exchanges within their countries.
Allegedly one of the key perpetrators, Geoffrey Auyeung, was indicted in August 2024. He is purported to have been the largest recipient of the funds and is purported to have used the funds to buy Bitcoin (BTC), Tether (USDT), USD Coin (USDC), and Ether (ETH). It is purported that much of the cryptocurrency was funneled to Binance, a global cryptocurrency exchange.
At the same time as arresting Auyeung, U.S. authorities also froze approximately $2.3 million in his bank accounts.The Justice Department alleges that victims were lured into investments in oil tank storage facilities that were falsely marketed as capable of generating rental income. However, it is claimed that after victims sent the funds, the so-called organizers were unreachable.
So far, prosecutors have tracked down $17.9 million in confirmed losses that investors suffered that could identify funds that investors lost due to their investments, and additional victims are likely to be identified as the investigation advances. If the court grants the request to forfeit $7.1 million, the funds recovered would reach $9.4 million, ultimately distributed to confirmed victims of the scheme.