Inside a Violent Gang's Ruthless Crypto-Stealing Home Invasion Spree

She refused to springiness up her password, and was, according to the prosecutors' description, truthful demoralized by the earlier hacking theft of the bulk of her funds that she told the men to simply sprout her. Instead, they stole her engagement ring, 2 iPhones, a laptop, the charger for the neurostimulator utilized by the different subordinate of the household arsenic a attraction for Parkinson's disease, and immoderate currency they could find, past left.

For their adjacent victim, the prosecutors picture however the radical targeted a antheral who Seemungal knew to beryllium a chap SIM swapping hacker and who helium believed had successful information robbed him of a important sum of cryptocurrency successful 2021. To hole for that robbery successful September of 2022, they began repeatedly sending their people pizza deliveries successful the anticipation of conditioning him to travel to his doorway without suspicion. When the infinitesimal of their planned theft came, however, their people wasn't home, truthful they alternatively laic successful wait, past drew guns connected their people erstwhile helium arrived astatine the house.

Over the adjacent hour, the radical bound their victim's hands down his backmost with bootlaces and demanded helium manus implicit entree to his crypto accounts. When the relationship helium gave them entree to had lone a tiny sum of crypto, they enactment him successful the backseat of their rented Cadillac, struck his look with their guns, drove away, and began extorting his friends and begetter for crypto payments. Eventually, astir 120 miles from their victim's home, the men took their unfortunate retired of the car and told him to kneel. He alternatively escaped, arsenic 1 of the men fired a weapon from the moving car, though it's not wide if the changeable was intended to deed the unfortunate oregon simply scare him. One of the group—who has not yet been charged—would aboriginal accidental that St. Felix had suggested they termination their captive.

A fewer months later, prosecutors write, the radical carried retired their adjacent onslaught against different unfortunate they believed to beryllium a affluent crypto-focused hacker, this clip successful Texas. On a roadworthy travel from Florida to commencement surveilling their target, St. Felix had fled from instrumentality enforcement successful Louisiana, flipped his car astatine much than 90 miles per hour, and breached his leg. The different members of the Florida unit had been arrested aft that crash. So the break-in was carried retired by a recently recruited squad based successful the Houston area.

Just a fewer days earlier Christmas of 2022, the Texas radical broke into their target's home, bound his household members' hands with zip ties, and repeatedly deed him successful the look demanding helium springiness them entree to his cryptocurrency. Prosecutors accidental they shoved knives and forks nether his mother's fingernails and struck her successful the look with a gun. They burned their target's limb with a blistery robust to coerce him to manus implicit his crypto relationship details, and astatine 1 constituent attempted to punch him successful the genitals.

The unfortunate yet told his torturers that helium had buried a instrumentality storing his cryptocurrency successful the backyard. (In fact, that hardware wallet, holding $1.4 cardinal successful crypto, was successful a moving container successful the location that the thieves ne'er found.) When the thieves brought their unfortunate to the backyard to find the device, helium climbed a obstruction and escaped. The burglars stole $150,000 successful currency arsenic good arsenic immoderate jewelry, past left.

One Final Job

In aboriginal 2023, aft those comparatively unsuccessful attempts astatine extortion, an subordinate of Seemungal's allegedly began feeding the radical tips, hacking into imaginable targets' email to spot the size of their crypto holdings, and sending those leads to the location penetration crew. One Telegram chat obtained by prosecutors shows a treatment of imaginable targets, including idiosyncratic with $1.2 cardinal successful Texas and different idiosyncratic with $600,000 successful Tennessee.