DOJ Opens $40M Compensation Process for OneCoin Crypto Fraud Victims

The U.S. Department of Justice has announced a compensation process for victims of OneCoin, the fake cryptocurrency strategy that defrauded investors of immoderate $4 cardinal done a planetary multi-level-marketing web from 2014 to 2019.

Victims tin present record petitions to assertion their stock of implicit $40 cardinal successful forfeited assets astatine onecoinremission.com, done a process administered by Kroll Settlement Administration LLC. The deadline for submissions is June 30.

“Victims are astatine the halfway of everything we bash astatine the Department of Justice,” said Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, successful a property release. “As we did successful this analyzable concern fraud case, the Department pursues forfeiture to instrumentality the nett retired of transgression and past usage that wealth to compensate victims wherever possible.”

Jay Clayton, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, called the announcement "an important measurement toward returning funds to those harmed," portion James C. Barnacle Jr., Assistant Director successful Charge of the FBI New York Field Office, noted the "monumental" unfortunate losses, saying galore "unknowingly depleted their savings for a fraudulent concern strategy successful an emerging fiscal ecosystem that would ne'er wage out."

The disposable compensation funds stem from palmy prosecutions of OneCoin's leadership. Karl Sebastian Greenwood, co-founder of OneCoin, was sentenced to 20 years successful situation successful 2023 for his relation successful orchestrating the fraud, with authorities seizing assets that present signifier portion of the unfortunate compensation pool.

The missing Cryptoqueen

Ruja Ignatova, the scheme's different co-founder known arsenic the "Cryptoqueen," remains astatine large. International authorities proceed to hunt for Ignatova, with the FBI adding her to its Ten Most Wanted Fugitives database and Europol placing her connected its most-wanted register.

In 2024, the U.S. State Department raised the bounty connected Ignatova to $5 million—but her disappearance remains unresolved, with alleged sightings successful Russia competing with theories that she may person been killed years earlier.

The Justice Department continues to prosecute Ignatova arsenic portion of the ongoing investigation, though her lack hasn't prevented authorities from recovering funds for victims. Earlier this year, a tribunal successful Guernsey seized $11.4 million linked to the OneCoin fraud.