White-Collar Fraudster Jailed in UK After Converting $650K in Company Funds to Crypto

A British antheral has received a 33-month situation condemnation aft being recovered blameworthy of embezzling implicit £500,000 ($659,500) from his leader and converting the stolen wealth into cryptocurrency, which helium utilized connected gambling websites.

39-year-old Jason Lowe, from Skipton successful North Yorkshire, had worked for the aforesaid Lancashire-based steadfast since 2016, but betwixt March 2023 and February 2024 siphoned disconnected the funds successful bid to provender his gambling addiction.

Structured arsenic an employee-owned spot wherever unit benefitted from nett rewards, the unnamed institution archetypal detected that thing was amiss erstwhile its concern section spotted an unusually precocious measurement of payments to 2 businesses, Meteorbrand and PPC Guru.

Lowe’s slope besides flagged ample sums of wealth entering his idiosyncratic account, including payments via PayPal, yet erstwhile questioned by the slope helium said that the sums were from the merchantability of his business, which had been completed successful 2021.

The Lancashire company’s probe initially aroused interior distrust, struggle and accent among unit members, with Lowe avoiding guilt for a play by the usage of “lies and mendacious accusations.”

However, the institution submitted an Action Fraud study successful February 2024, which led to North Yorkshire Police’s Economic Crime Unit opening its ain investigation.

Lowe pleaded blameworthy to fraud by maltreatment of presumption of trust, and connected Friday was sentenced astatine Bradford Crown Court to 33 months successful prison.

A proceeding nether the Proceeds of Crime Act volition instrumentality spot astatine an as-yet-undecided date, successful bid to statesman the effort to retrieve stolen funds.

Speaking successful a property release, Detective Constable Neil Brodhurst of NYP’s Economic Crime Unit said the unit is pleased with the condemnation handed to Lowe.

“Even though the stolen funds were converted into cryptocurrency, we were capable to hint the transactions and beryllium however helium benefited,” helium said. “Fraud is ne'er a victimless crime, and this lawsuit highlights the wider ripple effect of Lowe’s actions—undermining morale, trust, and fiscal stableness crossed the workforce.”

UK Police Force Gets $665K Bitcoin Windfall From Seizures

While figures connected this peculiar country of transgression stay limited, experts suggest that white-collar transgression involving cryptocurrencies is becoming much prevalent, with fiscal transgression tending to travel the money.

This is the presumption of Phil Ariss, a erstwhile crypto pb for the National Police Chiefs' Council Cybercrime Programme, and present the Director of UK Public Sector Relations astatine TRM Labs.

He told Decrypt, “We’re seeing much cases wherever trusted insiders misuse entree oregon institution funds and way worth into crypto for idiosyncratic trading, gambling, oregon laundering—patterns that intimately reflector the emergence successful accepted insider fraud during periods of marketplace enlargement oregon volatility.”