A 28-year-old founder sold a bank the biggest fish in the student-finance pond. The fish was a spreadsheet. Now, with seven years to serve, she is knocking on the door of a presidential pardon.
A bank account in the Channel Islands gave up £8.59 million tied to Ruja Ignatova. Eight years after Asha handed over her savings in a Mumbai hotel ballroom, a sliver of the money is moving toward Germany. The Cryptoqueen is not.
Bob Hunter ran a Springfield retirement shop called The Summit Group of Missouri. For years, his clients got statements showing their money was right where it should be. On June 11, he pleaded guilty to wire fraud and money laundering. The statements were the crime.
Eight years after Ruja Ignatova disappeared with billions, German and Guernsey authorities pulled £8.5 million back from the dark. For the people who bought OneCoin, the wire is real. The coin never was.
For six years, a small grocery in Lynchburg, Virginia ran a second business behind the first one. The customers came in for cash. The register did the rest.
In 2012, a man in A Coruña handed his usual lottery slip across a counter and was told it was nearly worthless. The clerk and his brother, a state lottery official, tried to pocket the €4.7 million themselves. Fourteen years later, a court finally named what happened at that counter.