Famous Crypto Personalities and Law Enforcement Agencies

In 2020 authorities in various parts of the world arrested numerous crypto personalities. Let’s have a look at some of the cases. Let’s start with Arthur Hayes. Last year, more precisely on October 1, the U.S. State Department of Justice charged Arthur Hayes who founded BitMEX as well as three of his associates for violating the Bank Secrecy Act.

This is not the end of the story, as the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission filed a civil enforcement action against Hayes as well as his company for going against AML regulations. Interestingly, the Hong Kong resident has been missing in action in public for several months. Moreover, the U.S. and Hong Kong suspended their extradition agreements in light of the recent political turmoil there. As a result, it will be hard to prosecute Hayes in the U.S.

Crypto personalities and Spanish authorities

John McAfee is one of the most famous crypto personalities in the world. Local authorities arrested the crypto evangelist and eccentric millionaire in Barcelona in 2020, regarding tax evasion charges levied by the U.S. government against him. Moreover, he is facing other charges as well. According to authorities, he promoted a series of questionable cryptocurrency projects, from which he allegedly profited millions of dollars.

It is worth mentioning that, Santiago Fuentes was the operator of a cryptocurrency arbitrage firm called Arbistar. The firm had tens of thousands of users investigating Bitcoin into its arbitrage trading bot.

Interestingly, suspicions arose several months ago when Fuentes claimed that as a result of a “digital error”, the company lost more than a quarter of its funds. However, Spanish authorities came to the conclusion that Fuentes was using his crypto outfit to allegedly facilitate various financial frauds to launder money. Authorities arrested Fuentes in October. Despite such cases, cryptocurrencies have the potential to transform the world.