Turkish Cryptocurrency Exchanges The head of “Thodex” and two of his relatives have each been sentenced to 11,196 years in prison for defrauding investors by defrauding millions of dollars, the BBC reports.
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29-year-old Faruk Fatih Ozer fled to Albania in 2021, taking investors’ assets with him, after the Thodex exchange he managed suddenly collapsed.
He was extradited back to Turkey in June and found guilty of money laundering, fraud and organized crime.
Ozer told the court that he “would not have acted so amateurishly” if his intent had been criminal, state media reported.
“I am smart enough to run any institution on Earth,” he was quoted as saying by Anadolu Agency. “This company that I started at the age of 22 proves that,” he added.
His sister Serapa and brother Gwen were also found guilty of the same charges in the brief trial in Istanbul.
The defendants were convicted of several crimes against 2,027 victims.
Such prison terms have been common in Turkey since the death penalty was abolished in 2004.
Prosecutors had asked Ozer to be sentenced to 40,562 years in prison, AFP reports.
“Thodex” was founded in 2017 and became one of the largest virtual currency exchanges in the country.
Turkish media previously reported that Ozer had absconded with assets worth $2 billion. The prosecutor’s indictment, on the other hand, estimates that the total loss to Thodex investors is 356 million liras. That amount was about $43 million at the time of the stock market crash. The same amount is now worth about $13 million as inflation soars and the lira has fallen on international markets.
2023-09-08 18:42:56
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