France Charges Alleged BTC-e Operator Alexander Vinnik Following Greek Extradition

French officers have charged Alexander Vinnik, the alleged operator of an trade that laundered tens of millions of {dollars} for criminals, on a number of counts together with extortion and cash laundering.

In keeping with a report by Bloomberg on Tuesday, Vinnik was interviewed by French prosecutors as quickly as he was extradited from Greece late final week. Zoi Konstantopoulou, a member of the protection counsel, mentioned in a information convention Tuesday that Vinnik was a blockchain and pc genius, focused for his Russian nationality and “persecuted” due to the menace he posed to the worldwide banking system.

France has charged Vinnik on counts of extortion, aggravated cash laundering, conspiracy and harming computerized data-processing programs, an official on the public prosecutor’s workplace instructed Bloomberg. Wished in a number of nations, Vinnik has maintained he’s harmless of all costs, arguing that he was simply an worker of the corporate.

Vinnik was extradited the identical day Greece’s Council of State, the nation’s supreme administrative courtroom, issued a ruling confirming that the extradition was lawful. Having been in detention since July 2017, Vinnik has been on a starvation strike over claims his human rights have been violated. He’s at present detained in a French hospital.

“Alexander’s crime is to be Russian and an individual with extraordinary technological data that might liberate folks economically,” Konstantopoulou mentioned. The protection has additionally complained in opposition to the “inhumane” size of his pretrial detention.

The investigation is at present underway and a trial has not but been ordered.

As soon as the courtroom case in France is full, Vinnik’s legal professionals mentioned he can be extradited again to Greece and to the U.S., the place he faces comparable costs. As soon as that case has been accomplished, he’ll then be despatched to Russia and face costs there.

“The Greek Minister of Justice has in essence determined that this individual goes to spend his life being extradited, judged after which re-extradited, re-judged and but once more re-extradited and re-judged,” Konstantopoulou mentioned.

Greece had turned down Russian requests for Vinnik’s extradition. Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly raised the matter the then-Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras in December 2018, in accordance to Russian media.

Vinnik has beforehand mentioned he wished to face trial in Russia.