An Alabama man who SIM-swapped his way into the SEC’s official X account, enabling a fake ETF announcement that briefly pumped Bitcoin, has been sentenced to 14 months in prison and three years of supervised release.
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It was somewhat encouraging to see Adam’s response to the strong criticism of his crypto shilling:
He made a full and sincere apology, thanked his fans for calling him out for being so stupid, decided not to take the money (freeing him from any contractual obligations) and went on to make a video explaining how dumb and sketchy this whole Orb company is. So, about the best we could hope for, I guess.
I saw that. I will remain skeptical, though, on whether he really is an ally. I still don’t understand what he was thinking.
Police searched the townhouse and recovered a saw, cocaine, chicken wire, body armor, night-vision goggles, ballistic helmets and firearms ammunition, according to prosecutors. They also allegedly found Polaroid photos of the kidnapped man with a gun held to his head and T-shirts printed with photos of the kidnapped man with a cocaine pipe in his mouth.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/05/25/bitcoin-torture-new-york-crypto/
One off-duty detective drove the victim from the airport to the townhouse on May 6, sources told ABC News.
The 20-year veteran detective has been assigned to the NYPD’s Executive Protection Unit, which handles the mayor’s security, since December 2021.
The detective works as part of the advance team, which checks out locations before the mayor arrives.
Damn, a lot to unpack there. These off-duty cops were directly employed by the torturers and one of them personally delivered the victim to a townhouse full of drugs, weapons and implements of torture? Seems like a few steps beyond placing them on “modified duty” are probably warranted.
Also, defense lawyers are gonna try for whatever arguments they can, but this is just ridiculous:
Really? The “he’s a wealthy holder of a degree in philosophy” defense? Thankfully the judge remained unconvinced and bail was denied.
Life imitates art. There was a recent episode of the Rookie that involved a recurring character (Skip Tracer Randy) becoming a bitcoin billionaire and then becoming the target of some kidnapping attempts.
No one sells their bitcoin for bitcoin.
