Cops find $3 billion in stolen Bitcoin stashed in a popcorn tin

Federal officials say the stolen Bitcoin was found when they served the search warrant at Zhong’s Georgia home, solving a decade-long mystery. 

The digital tokens were hidden in a ‘single board computer’ that was stashed inside a popcorn tin and stored in a bathroom close of Zhong’s home. 

Authorities also seized $662,000 in cash, physical Bitcoin coins, an 80 percent interest in a Memphis-based real estate investment company with substantial holdings, along with 11 1-ounce bars of silver and gold.

‘James Zhong committed wire fraud over a decade ago when he stole approximately 50,000 Bitcoin from Silk Road,’ U.S. attorney Damian Williams said in a statement this week. 

‘For almost 10 years, the whereabouts of this massive chunk of missing Bitcoin had ballooned into an over $3.3 billion mystery. Thanks to state-of-the-art cryptocurrency tracing and good old-fashioned police work, zafferanolight.com law enforcement located and recovered this impressive cache of crime proceeds.’

Prosecutors said Zhong executed a scheme to defraud ‘Silk Road’ dark web marketplace. They said he made nine accounts September 2012 and would then flood the site with withdrawal requests, which tricked the site into giving him multiples of what he had deposited.

After doing this 140 times, he had withdrawn all of the site’s cryptocurrency holdings. He then transferred the Bitcoin into separate accounts to keep it from being detected.

Silk Road is an online black market used to distribute illegal drugs and goods to buyers, xn--4kqz9dx34awsd.forex.wf according to the U.S. Attorney. 

‘Mr. Zhong executed a sophisticated scheme designed to steal bitcoin from the notorious Silk Road Marketplace,’ Special Agent in Charge Tyler Hatcher said.

‘Once he was successful in his heist, he attempted to hide his spoils through a series of complex transactions which he hoped would be enhanced as he hid behind the mystery of the darknet.’

Beginning in March 2022, Zhong began voluntarily surrendering to the government additional Bitcoin that he had access to and had not dissipated. In total, he voluntarily surrendered 1,004 additional Bitcoin.