The U.S. Secret Service has seized $860,000 from a Nigerian cryptocurrency account after investigations on a money trail indicated the funds were proceeds of a coordinated business email scam, according to court filings obtained by Peoples Gazette.
In accordance with U.S. laws, the U.S. Secret Service has applied for forfeiture in rem of the hundreds of thousands of dollars after tracking and linking the confiscated funds to fraud.
Secret Service Special Agent Jayson Bradshaw filed the forfeiture complaint in rem in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia on October 2, 2024. An arrest warrant in rem was issued on October 10 by Judge Claude M. Hilton.
An arrest warrant in rem grants a government agency the authority to seize fraudulent assets including property without waiting for the defendants’ argument.
The Nigerian whose name was withheld for security reasons allegedly intercepted email correspondence between a couple who wanted to purchase a new house and the law firm managing the sale.
The victim referred to as Victim 1 in court filings residing in Reston, Virginia on April 17 transferred $966,500 as closing cost of the house to what he believed was the account number of the law firm conducting the sale.
He had previously been exchanging emails with the firm and did not suspect foul play when he sent the funds for the property in Denver, North Carolina on April 17.
What the victim did not realise was that his email had been getting intercepted by the suspected Nigerian scammer since April 2, court filings showed. The suspect was communicating with both parties, sometimes acting as the law firm and other times pretending to be the buyers.
“Unbeknownst to VICTIM 1 at the time, the law firm began receiving emails around April 2, 2024 from spoofed email accounts which were similar to VICTIM 1 and his wife’s true email accounts,” stated the motion seeking forfeiture.
Both parties did not suspect anything amiss until April 19 when the couple and their realtor went to the law firm for a scheduled 10:00 a.m. appointment, only to discover the law firm had fixed the meeting for 2:00 p.m.
The attorney in charge of the sale asked the couple when they intended to finalise payment for the property.
Taken aback by the question, the victim responded that they already completed payment two days earlier and sent the funds to a Bank of America account ending in -0822, “per the wiring instructions he received via email on or about April 16, 2024.”
His statement set off alarm bells and he immediately reached out to his bank, Charles Schwab & Company, to report the fraudulent transfer, particularly that money was sent to an unintended account.
Investigations showed how the Nigerian suspect transferred the funds first to another account domiciled in Bank of America before moving them to his crypto account on April 18.
In total “$960,000.00 in fraud proceeds were sent to the CRYPTO ACCOUNT,” court filings stated.
On April 18, the suspect made a crypto transaction of “1.588106 Bitcoin (BTC), valued at $98,276.94 in proceeds to address: bc1qz3ms6tlc2d4lkrp6q6al28tkknyzvaflqt4y72, via transaction ID: b8c5516bd2373553b795c825247c54cbe6787afd16e97b69f5d0beb639ef4df8.”
The transaction incurred a charge of $1,723.
The 1.5 BTC transaction reduced the crypto balance to $860,000 which the Secret Service has already seized and is now seeking its forfeiture to the U.S. government.
A money trail of 1.5. BTC transfer led investigators to Binance address 1LdEvfQGAY4stVWpCo4ynMt1NUVDbY7JZG. Binance KYC (Know Your Customer) checks on the account showed that it belonged to a Nigerian citizen living in Turkey.
“Binance provided “know your customer” information for the above address, which identified a Nigerian national operating in Turkey as the owner of the account,” court filings stated. Records showed the equivalent of $89,999.97 had been withdrawn from the crypto account.
The U.S. Secret Service contends for the forfeiture of the funds in line with Title 18, United States Code that states money obtained from proceeds of unlawful activity be surrendered to the government.