Per a Mon announcement, the United states Department of Justice and the Southern District of New York have extradited from Panama a leader of declared Ponzi scheme AirBit Club.

Gutemberg Dos Santos is i of six operators of AirBit Club indicted, and the terminal to come up into the U.S. to face trial before the SDNY. Dos Santos is a dual citizen of Brazil and the United States. Authorities initially apprehended five of the six dorsum in Baronial, with a sixth avoiding government until October.

The DoJ alleges that AirBit Club sold "memberships" that promised guaranteed returns. The six operators marketed their returns as being the product of the club'southward mining operations and trading strategies. Per the DoJ, those operations didn't exist. Instead, membership dues went to funding farther marketing all effectually the world, including massive events to recruit new members and jet-set lifestyles for themselves.

Some of these events are viewable on AirBit Social club'south still-active website, with the near recent taking place in Sao Paulo, Brazil, final year.

One of the six indicted was Scott Hughes, a California attorney who, the DoJ alleges, aided AirBit Lodge'southward leadership "by, among other things, helping to remove negative information about AirBit Social club and Vizinova from the internet" — possibly past threatening libel suits to close downwardly dissent.

Hughes also stands defendant of helping the operation wash income via various client accounts.

1 of the most famous Ponzi schemes in crypto is PlusToken, which recently saw over $4 billion worth of crypto avails confiscated by the Chinese regime.