Chinese woman convicted after ‘world’s biggest’ bitcoin seizure

In the UK, a Chinese lady was found guilty in relation to what authorities said was the biggest cryptocurrency seizure in history, totaling over £5.5 billion.

Yadi Zhang, also known as Zhimin Qian, entered a guilty plea to charges of unlawfully obtaining and retaining large sums of money in bitcoin at Southwark Crown Court on Monday, September 29.

The Metropolitan Police claim that Qian, 47, was the mastermind of a massive fraud scheme that defrauded over 128,000 people in China between 2014 and 2017. Investigators have since seized at least 61,000 bitcoin wallets that contained the money.

According to a statement from the Met, “Zhang masterminded a massive scam in China between 2014 and 2017, robbing more than 128,000 victims and then storing the illicitly acquired money in bitcoin assets.”

Qian arrived in the UK in September 2018 after escaping China with fictitious documents. According to the police, she tried to use an accomplice, Jian Wen, to assist her launder the stolen funds by making real estate investments.

A seven-year worldwide inquiry that involved thousands of papers and several jurisdictions came to a close with her arrest. The investigation’s lead investigator, Detective Sergeant Isabella Grotto, said the conclusion was the consequence of “years of careful work.”

“Zhimin Qian had been avoiding punishment for five years when our team found her, and her arrest set off a complicated inquiry that required evidence from several jurisdictions and the meticulous examination of thousands of documents,” she stated.

“This is one of the biggest money laundering cases in UK history and among the highest-value cryptocurrency cases globally,” said Will Lyne, head of the Met’s Economic and Cybercrime Command.

Wen, a 44-year-old former takeaway employee, was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison last year for her assistance in Qian’s money laundering. Prosecutors claimed Wen’s rapid switch from living above a restaurant to a multimillion-pound rented mansion in London, combined with acquisitions like Dubai properties for over £500,000, prompted suspicion. Investigators later linked her to bitcoin transactions totaling more than £300m.

“Met detectives demonstrated she had been involved in enabling the migration of a cryptocurrency wallet, which included 150 bitcoin,” the Crown Prosecution Service said. This was worth £1.7 million at the time.

Qian is still being held for sentencing.