Charged With Money Laundering Case, Crypto Exchange Founder Bitzlato Seeks Support From Crypto Community

JAKARTA - Anatoly Legkodymov, co-founder and majority owner of cryptocurrency exchange Bitzlato, is facing a money laundering case in the United States. Legkodymov was arrested in January for allegedly being involved in a trading platform that processes millions of dollars in illegal funds.

However, Legkodymov is not alone in this legal problem. Several Bitzlato employees and executives were also detained in other countries. However, Legkodymov is trying to seek support from members of the crypto community to find US citizens who are willing to guarantee their release on bail.

Trade platform Bitzlato is registered in Hong Kong and has been disrupted by law enforcement in Europe. French investigators confiscated his server and hot wallet in mid-January. However, things got worse when Legkodymov was arrested in Miami on charges of money laundering by the US Department of Justice.

The exchange he leads has transferred at least 700 million US dollars (Rp10.6 trillion) in the form of proceeds from the crime of the ransomware perpetrators, the darknet market, and the crypto pyramid scheme. This makes Legkodymov have to appear in New York's federal court for the first time in mid-March and was ordered to be held without collateral.

However, US law allows defendants to be released before a decision is made in their case, provided they find a guarantee for their guarantee. Therefore, Legkodymov issued his call for help through crypto media.

A group of Russian colleagues urged those who wanted to help him contact him on Telegram, stating that the crypto community knew Anatoly as a good and law-abiding person and wanted to help him get out of prison on bail until the end of the trial.

According to reports, a user with the name "Anatically Legkodymov" has been active in the Bitcointalk.org forum since 2011 and in the Bits.media forum since 2016. The two forums are places where Legkodymov and his partner started their trading business under the name Changebot which later became Bitzlato.

Anton Shurenko, co-founder of Bitzlato, was detained, interrogated, and released by Russian police in February. In an interview on Youtube, Shkurenko revealed that Bitzlato intends to move to Russia and re-launch his company from there.

Although Bitzlato has partially restored access to user BTC balances, the exchange is still in big trouble due to the money laundering case it faces as reported by Bitcoin.com News. Support from members of the crypto community is Legkodymov's last hope for his freedom with certain guarantees.