- A Miami crypto fraudster has pleaded guilty to defrauding banks and crypto exchanges to the tune of $7.5 million
- Esteban Da Corte was one of a trio who used false purchase reversal claims to net millions
- The gang used stolen identities to conduct the scam multiple times
A Miami fraudster has pleaded guilty to defrauding a crypto exchange and U.S. banks into handing over millions of dollars. Esteban Da Corte is one of three individuals accused of using participating in a scheme to falsely obtain millions of dollars in cryptocurrency from an exchange and then trick banks into refunding the money to purchase it. The trio is accused of using stolen identities to register multiple times on the exchange in question, leaving them able to repeat the scam.
Bank Refunded Crypto Purchases
The Department of Justice alleged that Da Corte and his accomplices devised a plan to defraud U.S. banks and an unnamed cryptocurrency exchange platform by buying over $4 million in cryptocurrency and then falsely claiming that the transactions were not authorized. This deception led the banks and exchange to reverse the transactions and deposit the money into the trio’s bank accounts, which they withdrew.
To execute their plan, Da Corte and his crew created accounts with the exchange utilizing fake U.S. passports, driver’s licenses, and stolen personal identification information, with their accounts linked to their bank accounts. The gang then deposited money into the exchange and purchased cryptocurrency, which they then withdrew to their own wallets, after which they contacted their banks and claimed that the cryptocurrency purchases were unauthorized, which resulted in the banks reversing the transactions.
$4 Million in Fraudulent Reversals
This scheme operated by the trio caused the banks to process more than $4 million in fraudulent reversals, while the exchange lost over $3.5 million in cryptocurrency. Da Corte and his accomplices, Luis Hernandez Gonzalez and Asdrubal Ramirez Meza, were arrested in August last year after the banks became suspicious of the connected activity.
