Can Dealing Millions Of Bitcoin Send You To Jail?

Published 5 years ago on October 31, 2018

Can Dealing Millions Of Bitcoin Send You To Jail?

Following a recent news release summary from the United States Department of Justice, during a federal court hearing, one citizen from the US pled guilty to a crime relating to the crypto space and specifically, Bitcoin. The person in question is a man from San Diego called Jacob Burrell Campos who has confessed to operating an unlicensed money transmitting firm. The firm focused on the purchase and sale of crypto assets including Bitcoin. Campos allegedly sold thousands of dollars worth of Bitcoin to over a thousand customers across the nation in just over a year. The Department of Justice found that he ran the unlicensed business from 2015 to 2016. Selling Bitcoin isnâ€™t exactly illegal but that scale of the â€˜businessâ€™ most likely put the regulators in a loop which resulted in digital currencies fanatics unfortunate charging in federal courts. According to the release, Campos is only 21 years old and when he pled guilty he also admitted to operating a Bitcoin exchange with the US Department of Treasury Financial Crimes Enforcement Network's approval which is shunned in the crypto scene in the country. Â In addition, established platforms such as Coinbase and Gemini have allegedly failed to integrate proper anti-money laundering procedures, implying that he might have knowingly supplied BTC to felons. Campos also mentioned that he didnâ€™t perform due diligence on the source of his customersâ€™ funds, again opening the floor for consumers to use Camposâ€™ service for illegal acts. What did his exchange include? Campos used localbitcoins.com to advertise his Bitcoin offering, a prominent peer-to-peer BTC trading site, corresponding with his clients through email, text and through encryption enabled messaging platforms such as Telegram. As said by Ethereum World News:

â€œCampos reportedly negotiated for a 5% commision on all BTC sales, accepting fiat in-person, through ATMs, and through MoneyGram, netting himself a hefty profit as the trades racked up.â€

The now criminal went onto confess that the initially purchased his Bitcoin stock through a regulated exchange in the United States, however, he noted that his account was flagged and soon after shut down when he logged several suspicious transactions. After the closure of his account, Campos went to an exchange based in Hong Kong which he reportedly purchased upwards of $3.3 million in Bitcoin over 25 months in hundreds of different transactions. What are your thoughts? Let us know what you think down below in the comments!

Adrian Barkley

Adrian is an avid reader who first stumbled across Crypto after reading 'The Basics of Bitcoins and Blockchains' by Antony Lewis in 2018. Since then, Adrian has immersed himself within the industry, and has a real interest in Enterprise Blockchain solutions.