Police have arrested four suspects in Kyiv, Ukraine, for allegedly kidnapping and murdering a 29-year-old foreign national and Bitcoin investor of Moroccan origin.
The suspects are accused of stealing $170,000 worth of Bitcoin from the victim.
According to the Kyiv Independent newspaper, the suspects—four men aged 24 to 29—reportedly premeditated the attack, launching their assault around midnight on 29 July.
A report from the National Police of Ukraine details an incident that took place around midnight in the Solomianskyi district, where residents of a building heard screams and observed several men assaulting and dragging an individual into a vehicle.
This incident, initially reported by the Kyiv Independent newspaper, occurred around midnight, with the exact time not specified by the police.
Subsequent to the report, a large-scale police operation was initiated in Kyiv and its environs to apprehend the suspects.
The concerted efforts of various police units and operatives from the Main and Solomianskyi police departments resulted in the identification and capture of the four men implicated in the crime.
The police revealed that the victim was taken to an abandoned building in the Kyiv region, where he was coerced into transferring approximately 7 million Ukrainian hryvnias worth of Bitcoin (equivalent to around 2.55 BTC) into the criminals' crypto wallet.
The victim was then strangled to death, and his body was buried in a forest.
In a statement published on Facebook on Monday, the local police disclosed that the perpetrators interred the body in a forest.
Source: Kyiv Police Facebook Post
To obfuscate their trail, the suspects altered the car's license plates and appearance, buried the body in a forest, and exchanged the stolen cryptocurrency for cash in United States dollars and euros.
However, their attempts to evade capture were thwarted by the prompt and coordinated action of Kyiv law enforcement.
Investigations revealed that the suspects orchestrated the abduction after learning of the victim's substantial Bitcoin holdings.
They tracked him to his residence and launched their attack as he returned home around midnight.
The police agency wrote:
“Information about the man's abduction came to the capital's police around midnight. Residents of a house in Solomyansk district heard screams and saw several unknown people beating and forcibly putting a man in a car.”
CCTV footage released by the police in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, appears to show the moment that the victim was abducted.
They added:
“They [the assailants] carefully prepared a plan to kidnap the victim. They learned that the man had bitcoins, worth several millions of hryvnias [Ukrainian money], and decided to own them.”
The KORD special unit, in collaboration with other law enforcement personnel, successfully apprehended the suspects.
During the operation, the police confiscated money, the vehicle utilised in the crime, and other vital pieces of evidence.
The suspects, who have been taken into custody without the possibility of parole, are now confronting serious charges under the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
These charges include intentional murder for selfish motives, robbery, illegal deprivation of liberty committed by an organised group, and concealing a crime.
All detainees have been notified of their suspicion of committing these crimes, and the court has remanded them in custody without the possibility of bail.
Should they be convicted, all four detainees could face a potential life imprisonment sentence.
The cryptocurrency sector has been marred by both mysterious and explicable deaths over the years.
Assaults on cryptocurrency holders are far from rare—for example, at the recent ETHcc in Brussels, several attendees were victims of robbery.
Prominent figures within the industry contend that physical safety should be an integral component of a holder's security protocol.
This is not the first instance of criminals abducting someone for Bitcoin in Ukraine.
In December 2017, kidnappers in the country secured a ransom exceeding $1 million in Bitcoin for the release of Pavel Lerner, an employee of the British cryptocurrency platform Exmo Finance.
Lerner was taken hostage on 26 December by six masked men armed with guns and was forced into a minibus with stolen license plates.
A ransom was paid in Bitcoin three days prior to his release.
In 2022, the dismembered body of a crypto millionaire was discovered in a suitcase in Argentina, while another individual was bludgeoned to death with a dumbbell in Bulgaria, with their body parts disposed of through a drain.
Crypto-related deaths around the world between November 2022 and September 2023. Source: Cointelegraph
Bitcoin cypherpunk and Casa Co-Founder Jameson Lopp has highlighted that these criminals often identify potential victims through social media posts, public conversations, meetups, conferences, and sophisticated data harvesting from known and unknown breaches.
Lopp warned:
“Step up your OPSEC - I expect attacks to trend in correlation with the exchange rate.”
Lopp strongly cautions against engaging in peer-to-peer trades with untrusted individuals, flaunting wealth on social media, and wearing crypto-branded apparel.
In his recently published "A Bitcoiner's Guide to Organized Crime," Lopp emphasizes the importance of discretion and security awareness within the crypto community.
He wrote:
“Privacy is an important aspect of security. While it's not a complete solution to securing one's wealth, it's a good strategy to include in your security toolkit. The general premise is that if criminals are less aware of you, they are less likely to target you.”
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