AirBit Club Team Pleads Guilty to Fraud Charges: Details
- The executives behind AirBit Club, a “purported cryptocurrency mining and trading company,” have pleaded guilty to fraud charges.
- Pablo Renato Rodriguez, Gutemberg Dos Santos, Scott Hughes, Cecilia Millan, Karina Chairez, and Jackie Aguilar face up to 70 years in prison.
- Instead of doing any crypto trading or mining on behalf of investors, “the defendants built a Ponzi scheme,” said US Attorney for SDNY, Damian Williams.
- They will have to forfeit the funds that they made via their operations, including US dollars, Bitcoin (BTC), and real estate worth $100 million.
The regulators in the United States have been on a streak of cracking down on crypto exchanges that appear to have been engaging in fraudulent activities recently. Interestingly, the team of executives behind AirBit Club, a “purported cryptocurrency mining and trading company.” The team of executives and the company’s attorney have all been asked to forfeit the funds that they accumulated via their operations, including US dollars, Bitcoin (BTC), and real estate worth $100 million.
The United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Damian Williams, announced the guilty pleas of Pablo Renato Rodriguez, Gutemberg Dos Santos, Scott Hughes, Cecilia Millan, Karina Chairez, and Jackie Aguilar on March 8th “for their roles in an internationally coordinated fraud and money laundering ring that deceived individuals into investing in AirBit Club.”
The co-founders of the fraudulent firm, Dos Santos and Rodriguez, pleaded guilty in the presence of United States District Judge George B. Daniels on October 21, 2021, and March 8, 2022, respectively. Moreover, senior AirBit Club promoters Chairez, Millan, and Aguilar pled guilty before Judge Daniels on January 31, February 8, and February 22, respectively.
Daniels will process the judgment for the AirBit Club promoters on June 28, July 25, and June 27, 2023, respectively, while Scott Hughes, the attorney who laundered AirBit Club fraud proceeds for the co-founders, will be sentenced on August 9, 2023. It is important to note here that Hughes also pleaded guilty on March 2.
“The defendants took advantage of the growing hype around cryptocurrency to con unsuspecting victims around the world out of millions of dollars with false promises that their money was being invested in cryptocurrency trading and mining,” said Williams.
Williams also added that instead of doing any cryptocurrency trading or mining on behalf of investors, “the defendants built a Ponzi scheme and took the victims’ money to line their own pockets. These guilty pleas send a clear message that we are coming after all of those who seek to exploit cryptocurrency to commit fraud.”
The announcement notes that Rodriguez, Dos Santos, Hughes, Millan, Chairez, and Aguilar traveled throughout the US, Latin America, Asia, and Eastern Europe, hosting lavish expos and small community presentations to convince people to purchase AirBit Club memberships.
Moreover, the promoters would provide the newly joined members with access to their “online portals,” where they would see their supposed profits. However, these profits were fake, and no real mining was taking place on behalf of investors.
All the victims who complained about the returns and withdrawals “were met with excuses, delays, and hidden fees amounting to more than 50% of the victim’s requested withdrawal, if they were able to make any withdrawal at all.”
The entire team has pleaded guilty to charges including wire fraud conspiracy, carrying a maximum potential sentence of 20 years in prison; money laundering conspiracy, carrying a maximum potential sentence of 20 years in prison; and bank fraud conspiracy, carrying a maximum potential sentence of 30 years in prison. Therefore, these fraudsters might be behind bars for at most 70 years.
Additionally, the case is being handled by the Office’s Money Laundering and Transnational Criminal Enterprises Unit, and the Assistant U.S. Attorneys Kiersten A. Fletcher, Samuel L. Raymond, and Cecilia E. Vogel is in charge of the prosecution.
As reported earlier by BitcoinWisdom, the SEC has accused a Utah-based firm called Green United LLC and its founder, Wright W. Thurston, of operating a fraudulent Ponzi scheme. The firm, its founder, and its contracted promoter, Kristoffer A. Krohn, offered unregistered securities between April 2018 and December 2022, the regulator claims.
A crypto journalist with over 3 years of experience in DeFi, NFT, metaverse, etc. Parth has worked with major media outlets in the crypto and finance world and has gained experience and expertise in crypto culture after surviving bear and bull markets over the years.
