US Department of Justice Prosecutes 21 year Old Crypto Trader For Illegal Transactions

The recent ongoings in the market indicate a huge win for the authorities considering more and more wrongdoers are being put behind bars. The latest such win came for the US Department of Justice, who recently prosecuted a 21-year-old bitcoin dealer on account of illegal transactions and money laundering. The accused is Jacob Burrell Campos who is a native of California.

The Department of Justice in the Southern District of California has made a public announcement where they have stated that Jacob Burrell Campos has been arrested on the basis of “31-count indictment charging him with operating an illegal money transmitting business, failing to maintain an anti-money laundering program, international money laundering and conspiracy to structure monetary transactions.” He was caught when he tried to enter the States from Mexico via the Otay Mesa Port of Entry. He is currently being held without bail as was ordered in a hearing that took place on Friday.

The prosecutors claim that from January 2015 to April 2016, Burrell had sold crypto to around 900 traders in the US, which amounted to something around to $750,000. He did this via his own exchange service after his account in Coinbase, a US based crypto exchange, was shut down because of his reluctance to verify his ID. To keep his exchange going, Jacob also committed money laundering, approximately 28 times.

A resident of Baja California, Mexico, the court has found that Burrell has significant ties to Mexico and has citizenship in two other countries. They also found out that he had “agreed with others to smuggle over $1 million in U.S. dollars into the United States from Mexico, in amounts slightly less than $10,000, in order to avoid the currency reporting requirements.” If found guilty, the statutory maximum punishment for him will be five years in prison and a fine of $250,000.