Russian Government Seizes $10 Million From an Ex-law Enforcement Official

The 103 BTC captured in the case of Tambiev shows just 4% of the overall bribe amount, as per the local sources

As per the reports, Tambiev was arrested in March 2022, and enforcement officials tracked down his Bitcoin wallet private keys

As per the reports, the bribery was offered in exchange for hindering the criminal prosecution of attackers and an opportunity to conceal crypto assets

As per the local reports, the government has seized around $10 million worth of Bitcoin from a former law enforcement executive. The court enforcement officials of Russia have initiated seizing Bitcoin from a former official at the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF) in a big bribery case consisting of cryptocurrency

The executives started proceedings to capture 1 billion Russian rubles estimated to be about $10 million, or about 103 BTC from former ICRF official Marat Tambiev, who was accused of crypto bribery one year back, as reported by TASS on January 8

The captured Bitcoin

The seized Bitcoin will be added to the state revenue of Russia as part of the legal proceedings. Executives allegedly accessed the hardware crypto wallet of Tambiev, a Ledger Nano X, to capture the assets

The 103 BTC captured in the case of Tambiev shows just 4% of the overall bribe amount, as per the local sources. In October last year, a court in Russia sentenced Tambiev to 16 years in prison for acknowledging a bribe of 2,718 BTC, whose worth is about $258 million

The case has been reported as the biggest bribery case ever in the history of Russia, as per the local media outlet RBC. One year ago, the Nikulinsky District Court of Moscow ordered the capturing of 1,032 BTC, whose worth is about $98 million, from Tambiev, mentioning that the assets were captured by unconfirmed income

Tambiev’s arrest

As per the reports, Tambiev was arrested in March 2022, and enforcement officials tracked down his Bitcoin wallet private keys on his laptop in a folder named “Retirement.” The officials and the court judged that Tambiev got thousands of BTC from a hacker group referred to as the Infraud Organization

The members of the group, Kazakhstani citizens Mark and Konstantin Bergman and Estonian citizen Kirill Samokutyaev, allegedly bribed Tambiev for different procedural judgments, consisting of their own criminal case

After that investigation, it was concluded that the bribery case consisted of various ICRF employees who reportedly forced a bribe from Infraud Organization hackers

As per the reports, the bribery was offered in exchange for hindering the criminal prosecution of attackers and an opportunity to conceal crypto assets worth around 14 billion rubles estimated to be about $138 million, as per TASS