₦airaland Forum

Two young men accused of committing one of the largest person-to-person crypto thefts in U.S. history went on a brazen spending spree that included buying exotic cars and a $2 million wristwatch, renting mansions and running up nightclub tabs of hundreds of thousands of dollars apiece, new court records reveal.

The men, Malone Lam, 20, and Jeandiel Serrano, 21, conspired last month to steal the cryptocurrency funds from a person in Washington, D.C., according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia.

After disguising their theft by spreading the money between several cryptocurrency exchanges and mixing services, the authorities said, the men went on their spending spree.

Mr. Lam, a citizen of Singapore who operated under aliases including “Anne Hathaway,” and Mr. Serrano, who went by “VersaceGod," were arrested by the F.B.I. on Wednesday.

Month before they were arrested, Serrano, Lam and other, unnamed, co-conspirators targeted a man in Washington "because they believed he held a considerable amount of virtual currency" after they "identified him as a high net-worth investor from the early days of cryptocurrency," court filings say.

In early August, one co-conspirator caused an "unauthorized Google account access" notification to be sent to the victim, making it appear that the purported access attempts had occurred overseas, a court filing said.

"In reality, this was just the conspirators laying the groundwork for their imminent theft through sophisticated social engineering," prosecutors wrote in a filing.

On Aug. 18, members of the conspiracy called the man, claiming they were from Google's security team, and asking him about the recent unauthorized access attempts.

"Through a series of prompts and misrepresentations," the co-conspirators managed to manipulate the man into giving them enough information to access his Google drive, "where they quickly located personal financial information, including the location of his virtual currency holdings with Gemini," a crypto exchange, a filing said.

Serrano and other scheme participants then called the man back and Serrano posed as a member of Gemini's support team, prosecutors said.

While he talked to the victim, Serrano and his co-conspirators were communicating with each other on the Discord and Telegram messaging apps, strategizing on ways to "manipulate the victim into providing private keys to his virtual currency holdings and enough computer access for the conspirators to steal his entire savings," the filing said.


The schemers then duped the man into downloading a program onto his computer to protect his Gemini holdings.

But the program actually gave the co-conspirators real-time access to the victim's desktop, according to prosecutors.

"Serrano was eventually able to manipulate the victim into opening files with private keys
to over 4,100 Bitcoin," the court filing said.

"While Serrano continued to manipulate the victim, his co-conspirator used this access to quickly steal the entirety of the victim's virtual currency holdings."

Prosecutors said the co-conspirators split the theft's proceeds five ways.

The schemers then used "sophisticated money laundering techniques to hide the proceeds and mask their identities," a court filing alleges.

Serrano created an account on TradeOgre.com and deposited $29 million worth of cryptocurrency, "believing it to be clean and successfully laundered," the filing said.

Lam, who was arrested in Miami after traveling there from Los Angeles on a private jet, was renting multiple homes in Miami, according to the filing.

One mansion he rented there cost $68,000 per month, the filing said.

Lam, had also purchased a watch for $2 million and a Lamborghini Revuelto for more than $1 million, prosecutors said.

But “many of Lam’s vehicles have not been located as of yet, such as his Pagani Huayra that he purchased for $3,800,000,” prosecutors wrote.

In all, Lam “admitted to purchasing 31 luxury automobiles, 22 of which have yet to be recovered by law enforcement,” prosecutors wrote.

Lam “also admitted to doing additional hacks and making millions from those separate cryptocurrency fraud schemes, which he states have supported his entire lifestyle since arriving in the United States in October 2023,” prosecutors wrote.

“The three vehicles Serrano admitted to purchasing have also not yet been located.”

Federal government surveillance captured Lam on “a spending spree of the victim’s assets,” which included sightings of him “at Los Angeles nightclubs ... and gifting handbags valued at tens of thousands of dollars,” a court filing says.

Management at L.A. nightclubs told investigators that Lam tried to pay his tabs in cryptocurrency “and was spending approximately $400,000-$500,000 per night,” the filing said. One receipt from an L.A. club showed Lam spent ”$569,528.39 in one night,” the filing said.

After Serrano was arrested at Los Angeles International Airport on Sept. 18, when he returned from the Maldives with his girlfriend, an FBI agent interviewed that woman, who denied knowledge of Serrano’s involvement in crimes, according to a court filing.

“The interviewing FBI Agent told her that the only way to make the situation worse would be for her to call Serrano’s associates and tip them off to the arrest,” the filing noted.

“Immediately after leaving the interview'

Serrano’s girlfriend promptly called his criminal associates, tipped them off to his arrest, and these associated in turn deleted their Telegram accounts and all incriminating evidence included in saved chats,” the filing said.

“To date, approximately $70,000,000 has been recovered or frozen on various exchanges,” prosecutors wrote in a court filing.

“Even considering the millions of dollars that Serrano and his co-conspirators spent on automobiles and jewelry, well over $100,000,000 remains unaccounted for.”

Serrano had about $20 million of the victim’s stolen bitcoin on his phone, and agreed to transfer those funds back to the FBI, according to a court filing.

jeeeez thank God Nigerians no involve for this one

Thank God no Nigerian involve

Foolish people, why is it that when people steal money they spend it anyhow, instead to lay low

These guys are the highest scammers...

What baffles me is how they still went to steal more after the huge sum they stole... could it be that their lifestyles demands so much such that they need to keep defrauding people to maintain it? Nawa o

Lol...These guys are sophisticated cyber criminals. I thought they say btc is not real money, so why does FBI get involved whenever there is a btc theft?

Truly, Nigeria de behind . 😂. Wow. This one alone no pass hushpupi? Mk people stop to de whine is o like say na we scam pass

Agba Yahoo.

Respect 👍

Well

Money get spirit

This is the real yahoo plus.

Rplamer12:
Money get spirit

You correct my dear.
You go dey pray for 1 million naira you go stop gee but when you get d moni, greed go allow person demand for more moni till gbese happen

Nigerians are not anywhere near the real yahoo guys in this world. We’re just loud & ended us as scape goats

Do you know there are government sponsored yahoo? But no, the media won’t ever tell you that

Thief dey repent?

Clairvoyancy:
What baffles me is how they still went to steal more after the huge sum they stole... could it be that their lifestyles demands so much such that they need to keep defrauding people to maintain it? Nawa o

The article didn't explain how they did it.

God... This is yahoo proproMAX!

Interesting brain work!

Omo them this young dude be Odogwu.

Na these ones senior Hush puppy,abi na Hush puppy be their elder bro ...

See as children manipulate a full grown business man..

Na wah o.. Some phipho three do oh..

Foolish did higly irresponsible youths.

The man’s savings getting blown up at half a million dollars every night. Thankfully that’s the USA where fraudsters are jailed mercilessly. They probably would be getting 40 years in jail each.

saintjimos:
Thank God no Nigerian involve

Nigerians no get this high sense of stealing
It's poverty that makes some Nigerian kids doing Yahoo yahoo