The Shanxi court in China has cracked a USDT fraud case, and two accomplices have been given heavy sentences

The Wanfanglin District Prosecutor's Office in Taiyuan City, Shanxi Province, China, recently announced the first-instance verdict in the case of Chen and Li, who were prosecuted for concealing and hiding criminal proceeds. The court accepted the sentencing recommendations from the prosecution, sentencing the two to two years and six months, and one year and six months of imprisonment, respectively, along with fines.

In May of this year, Ms. Zhang met "Lin Hao" (who has not been apprehended) on a short video platform. He falsely claimed to have information on the stock price fluctuations of a well-known company and stated that she could profit by registering an account on the company's internal website to "buy long," but it required transactions in US dollars. She was instructed to exchange cash for US dollars with designated merchants and then transfer the dollars to his comrade's account, who would then transfer it to the company's account. On May 21, following "Lin Hao's" instructions, Ms. Zhang brought 1.47 million yuan in cash to a hotel in Wanfanglin District to prepare for the dollar exchange. Under the direction of their superior, Chen and Li went to connect with Ms. Zhang. Ms. Zhang forwarded the US dollar account provided by "Lin Hao" (which was actually a Tether account of the scammer) through Chen to their superior, who transferred a total of 202,328 Tether (approximately 1.47 million yuan) to that account in three installments. Chen and Li then handed over the 1.47 million yuan in cash received from Ms. Zhang to their superior. However, "Lin Hao" did not transfer the funds to the account Ms. Zhang had opened with the company as agreed, and upon realizing she had been scammed, Ms. Zhang reported it to the police.

The prosecuting attorney reviewed the case files and consulted with investigators immediately, proposing a core investigative direction regarding the actions of suspects Chen and Li: to retrieve chat records to secure evidence that the two "knew the funds were abnormal"; to clarify the flow of funds, tracing the ultimate destination of the Tether through data from virtual currency trading platforms, confirming the objective fact that they assisted in transferring criminal proceeds. After investigation, the public security agency transferred the case to the Wanfanglin District Prosecutor's Office for review and prosecution on August 17. Upon review, the office found that both Chen and Li confessed to "knowing that the fund operations were too concealed and involved large cash transactions, which definitely had issues." The two received a benefit fee of 30,000 yuan afterward, which was sufficient to establish that they knew it was criminal proceeds; their actions in assisting the "cash → US dollars → Tether" cross-border conversion constituted the act of "concealing and hiding criminal proceeds."

After the verdict, the office issued a risk warning letter to relevant units, outlining the typical characteristics of "investment scams + virtual currency money laundering," and collaborated with the anti-fraud center and other relevant units to carry out anti-fraud publicity activities. Sun Yinping, the chief prosecutor of the Wanfanglin District Prosecutor's Office, stated that in response to new types of telecom network fraud-related crimes, the office will continue to deepen the "investigation-prosecution collaboration + precise charges + social governance" mechanism, aiming to combat fraud crimes while severely punishing "accomplices," and fully protect the property safety of the public.