Alexander Vinik, the Russian arrested in Greece in 2017 on suspicion of money laundering through a digital cryptocurrency platform, was convicted in France three years later and is now awaiting trial in California, he pleaded partially guilty, TASS news agency reported, citing his lawyer.
Lawyer Arkady Book said that as a result of the plea agreement with prosecutors, he expects Vinik, also known as “Mr Bitcoin”, to be sentenced to less than 10 years in prison.
“He pleaded guilty to a limited number of charges,” the agency quoted Book as saying, adding that Vinik faced up to life in prison. “The culmination of the negotiations was the agreement with the prosecution. We expect the sentence to be up to 10 years.”
He could have been sentenced to 55 years in prison
Vinik was accused of laundering more than $4 billion through the cryptocurrency bitcoin. He was arrested in 2017 in Greece, extradited to France, where he was sentenced to five years in prison for money laundering, sent back to Greece and then extradited to the US in 2022.
According to the US Department of Justice, Vinik allegedly owned and operated BTC-e, a major cybercrime and digital money-laundering entity that allowed users to trade in bitcoins anonymously, and “developed a client base based on in criminal activity”.
The maximum sentence he could have been given in the US for the charges he faced was 55 years, according to the Justice Department’s website.
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