Paris court convicts Alexander Vinnik

The operator of the non-existent BTC-e crypto exchange, Alexander Vinnik, was sentenced to 5 years in prison formoney laundering.

French court recognized Russian citizenguilty of money laundering "as part of an organized criminal group" and "providing false information about the origin of the proceeds." For his crimes, Vinnik was sentenced to five years in prison and will have to pay an additional fine of 100,000 euros.

French prosecutors also accused Vinnik of extortion, conspiracy and development of a ransomware known as Locky, but the court decided to drop the charges.The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) also stated that Vinnik held a senior position on the cryptocurrency exchangeBTC-e, which was responsible for laundering more than $4 billion.The Justice Department also charged him with "computer intrusion and burglary incidents, ransomware fraud, identity theft schemes."

At the request of the Ministry of Justice, Vinnik wasarrested by the Greek authorities back in July 2017. Since then, Greece has received a number of extradition requests from the United States, Russia and France. The final decision was made in January 2020, when the Russian citizen was extradited to France.

Back in June, the police in New York recovered $90 million worth of assets allegedly linked to Vinnik and his case.

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