Karl Greenwood, the Co-Founder of OneCoin, the multi-billion dollar cryptocurrency pyramid scheme, has pleaded guilty to charges of wire fraud and money laundering in connection with his role in the fraudulent crypto project. The counts before him carry a maximum potential sentence of 20 years each, the Department of Justice (DOJ) said on Friday.
Greenwood, who was arrested in Thailand in July 2018 and extradited to the United States, confessed to the offenses in a Manhattan federal court before Judge Edgardo Ramos who accepted the guilty plea. He is to be sentenced by Judge Ramos on April 5, 2023, DOJ said.
“This guilty plea by the Co-Founder of OneCoin caps a week at the Southern District of New York (SDNY) that sends a clear message that we are coming after all those who seek to exploit the cryptocurrency ecosystem through fraud, no matter how big or sophisticated you are,” Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for SDNY, said in the DOJ statement.
Ruja ‘Cryptoqueen’ Ignatova Remains at Large
According to DOJ, Ruja Ignatova, who co-founded OneCoin alongside Greenwood, remains at large. The declaration comes eight months after Ignatova, also known as “the Cryptoqueen” was included in the list of Europe’s most wanted fugitives by Europol. The run-away Co-Founder was also added to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) Top 10 Most Wanted List earlier in June.
On October 12, 2017, the United States charged Ignatova with fraud and money laundering at the US District Court for the SDNY. It also issued a federal warrant for her arrest. In addition, the FBI has offered to pay $100,000 to anyone with information that leads to her arrest.
However, since Ignatova traveled on a commercial flight from Sofia, Bulgaria, to Athens, Greece on October 25, 2017, she has not been seen publicly, DOJ noted.
The Backstory
Greenwood and Ignatova founded OneCoin in 2014 in Sofia, Bulgaria from where they marketed and sold the fraudulent scheme through global multi-level marketing (MLM). DOJ noted that as a result of misrepresentations the Co-Founders and others made about OncCoin, victims across the globe invested over four billion dollars in the scheme.
“This MLM structure influenced the rapid growth of the OneCoin member network. Indeed, according to OneCoin’s…
