Ohio man jailed for bitcoin theft; He will lose $20 million worth of cryptocurrency – WHIO TV 7 and WHIO Radio

WASHINGTON, DC — A 31-year-old Ohio man was sentenced Thursday to four years and three months in prison for stealing more than 712 bitcoins, proceeds of darknet bitcoin mixer Helix, and forfeiting a then-pending criminal case, the said Deputy Attorney General of the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division.

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Gary James Harmon, 31, of Cleveland, perpetrated a cryptocurrency theft scheme that was the subject of a pending criminal case in the case of his brother, Larry Dean Harmon, according to US District Court documents in Washington, DC

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Kenneth Polite Jr., Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves for the District of Columbia, Assistant Director Bryan Vorndran of the FBI’s Cyber ​​Division, Special Agent in Charge David Sundberg of the FBI’s Washington Field Office and Acting Das shared the Associate Special Agent Kareem Carter, IRS Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) in Washington, DC.

In February 2020, Larry Harmon was arrested for his operation of Helix, a dark web-based cryptocurrency money laundering service known as “Mixer” or “Tumbler.” Helix laundered more than 350,000 bitcoin — worth more than $300 million at the time of the transactions — on behalf of clients, with the largest volume coming from dark web markets, Polite said.

Law enforcement seized various assets, including a cryptocurrency storage device containing Larry Harmon’s illicit earnings from operating Helix, which was forfeited in criminal proceedings. However, due to the device’s additional security features, law enforcement was initially unable to recover bitcoins stored on the device.

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Knowing that the government was attempting to recover the bitcoins stored on the confiscated device for use in Larry Harmon’s criminal case, Gary Harmon used his brother’s credentials to recover the bitcoin wallets stored on the device and secretly recovered more than 712 worth of bitcoins of about $4.8 million transferred back then into his own wallets. He stole these funds and obstructed the pending criminal forfeiture process.

Gary Harmon further laundered the proceeds through two online bitcoin mixing services before using the laundered bitcoins to fund large purchases and other expenses.

Gary Harmon agreed to the forfeiture of cryptocurrencies and other assets derived from the fraudulently collected proceeds, including more than 647.41 Bitcoin (BTC), 2.14 Ethereum (ETH) and 17,404,400.64 Dogecoin (DOGE). Due to the increase in market prices, the total value of these forfeitable properties exceeds US$20 million.

In August 2021, Larry Harmon pleaded guilty to his money laundering conspiracy case.

The FBI and the IRS-CI District of Columbia Cyber ​​Crime Unit were investigating the case.

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