Bitcoin News Today: Ex-NCA Officer Sentenced for Stealing 50 Bitcoin Worth $5.9 Million

Paul Chowles, a former operational officer with the National Crime Agency, has been sentenced to five-and-a-half years in prison for stealing 50 Bitcoin, which is now worth approximately $5.9 million. The Bitcoin was seized from Thomas White, the co-founder of the defunct online black market Silk Road 2.0, during an investigation into the platform.

Chowles was part of the team investigating Silk Road and its successor, Silk Road 2.0. He was the lead in extracting and analyzing data from devices owned by White. The NCA had seized 97 Bitcoin from White when he was arrested in November 2014. However, 50 BTC, worth around $79,000 at the time, were transferred from his wallet in May 2017 to another address. Chowles attempted to obscure the origins of the Bitcoin by sending it through the crypto mixing service Bitcoin Fog.

Chowles' actions were discovered when White alerted the police that someone else had moved the Bitcoin. White suspected that it had to be someone from within the NCA, as it was the only authority with the keys to his crypto wallet. Merseyside Police officers met with the NCA to discuss the investigation, and later arrested Chowles after launching an investigation into the stolen Bitcoin.

During the investigation, police found a phone that linked Chowles to an account used to transfer Bitcoin. The phone also had internet search history for a crypto exchange. Several notebooks were discovered in Chowles' office, which contained usernames, passwords, and statements relating to White’s cryptocurrency accounts. Chowles used two crypto-enabled debit cards to spend a total of around 109,425 British pounds ($146,580), but the Crown Prosecution Service calculated that he benefited financially to the tune of around 613,150 British pounds ($821,345).

The Crown Prosecution Service said that Chowles was regarded as someone who was competent, technically minded, and very aware of the dark web and cryptocurrencies. He took advantage of his position working on this investigation by lining his own pockets while devising a plan that he believed would ensure that suspicion would never fall upon him. The CPS will pursue confiscation proceedings against Chowles.

Silk Road 2.0 was a successor of the original Silk Road and was spun up a month after the FBI took down the online black market and arrested its founder, Ross Ulbricht, in October 2013. It lasted a year until it was shut down by the FBI. The case highlights the challenges law enforcement agencies face in securing and managing seized cryptocurrencies, as well as the potential for insider threats within these agencies.