So, it seems that the Kansas banker (Shan Hanes) who ripped off thousands and thousands from his small-town financial institution in Kansas, misplaced a lot of his loot to a pig butchering crypto rip-off, tied to a Philippines name centre, in line with a Division of Justice (DoJ) grievance.
In keeping with the grievance filed on 18 June 2025, the DoJ’s persecutors have initiated a civil forfeiture motion concentrating on over $225 million in laundered USDT, tied to Shan Hanes, the disgraced CEO of the Heartland Tri-State Financial institution, embezzling over $47 million from the financial institution, triggering the collapse of the agricultural lender in 2023.
A crypto trade offered crucial data to the DoJ, which led to the regulatory physique figuring out a fancy modus operandi utilized by the scammers to launder unlawful funds.
Authorities have recovered a complete of 93 deposit accounts, the place scammers coerced their victims into depositing USDT. As soon as victims deposited the funds, they circulated via as many as 100 middleman wallets to obscure the supply of the funds and to combine deposits from a number of victims.
As soon as they obscured the supply of funds, the scammers then transferred these funds to OKX accounts in two reshuffling phases. They initially transferred the fund to 22 OKX holding accounts after which reshuffled it amongst 122 further OKX accounts.
BREAKING: Kansas banker Shan Hanes, who stole $47M from Heartland Tri-State Financial institution, misplaced thousands and thousands to abroad crypto scammers in a DOJ-busted $225M USDT laundering scheme.
• DOJ ties rip-off to
name middle
• OKX helped hint 200+ wallets
• Financial institution collapsed in 2023
• Hanes… pic.twitter.com/X6Atn9znlO— CryptoAI (@QCryptoAI) June 19, 2025
All OKX accounts had been linked via shared IP addresses, reusable KYC paperwork, traced to a Manila-based crypto rip-off centre – ITECHNO Specialist Inc.
The DoJ has estimated an astronomical $3 billion in transaction quantity generated by this Manila-based laundering community.
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Hans Referred to Each as a Perpetrator and a Sufferer
In keeping with the DoJ grievance, Hanes embezzled thousands and thousands from the Heartland Tri-State Financial institution from 30 Could to 7 July 2023, a interval that falls between the financial institution’s quarterly regulatory reporting cycles, to keep away from detection. On this time-frame, Hanes initiated 10 wire transfers amounting to just a little over $47.1 million.
The grievance additionally takes under consideration the Federal Reserve’s (FED) report on the collapse of the Heartland Tri-State Financial institution. The regulatory physique discovered a complete of 434 victims of the crypto rip-off, with 60 victims shedding a mixed worth of $19.4 million, roughly.
Heartland Tri-State Financial institution, which held $13.7 million in capital and $139 million in property, had its liquidity affected by Hanes’s actions, which induced the financial institution to provoke an emergency borrowing price $21 million.
Because of this, the financial institution was left with a large $35 million gap in its coffers and was shut down by the regulators in July 2023.
Moreover, as earlier reported by CNN, Hanes additionally stole $40,000 from the Elkhart Church of Christ, $10,000 from the Santa Fe Funding Membership, $60,000 from his daughter’s faculty fund and at last, nearly $1 million in shares from the finance agency, Elkhart Monetary.
In August 2024, the court docket sentenced Hanes to 24 years in jail. In the meantime, the DoJ has named him each the perpetrator and a sufferer of this specific pig butchering rip-off.
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Crypto Scam Property Headed for FED Holdings
Whereas the bitcoin reserve and the stockpile of different cryptocurrencies should not but in place, the seized USDT is extremely more likely to find yourself within the FED’s crypto stockpile.
The Treasury Division has been auditing the US authorities’s digital asset holdings to find out cryptocurrencies and varied different digital property that it wants to carry.
Since officers have recovered solely a small share of these affected by the rip-off, complete compensation to the victims from the seized USDT stays unsure.
Key Takeaways
- Shan Hanes misplaced $3.3M from his embezzled $47M to a pig butchering rip-off
- Scammers reshuffled stolen funds in two phases linked to a complete of 144 OKX accounts
- Investigators traced all OKX accounts to a compound in Manila, Philippines
The publish DoJ Files $225M Civil Forfeiture Case Linked to Crypto Scam Perpetrated by Disgraced CEO Shan Hanes appeared first on 99Bitcoins.
