A Crypto.com customer who accidentally sent $6.95 million from an exchange in 2021 and then allegedly went on a spending spree has been released on bail in Australia, although $2 million in funds remains unaccounted for.
In Victoria County Court, prosecutors tried on March 20 to convince a judge that imprisonment would be the only way to ensure Jatinder Singh would not flee the country.
The Crypto.com blunder occurred when a Bulgarian employee accidentally transferred $6.95 million into his account instead of the $100 that was supposed to be refunded in May 2021. The Melbourne man is alleged to have used the funds and sent some overseas. Prosecutors argued that Singh was financially motivated to flee the country as only $4.9 million was recovered, the Herald Sun reported. Of the $2 million that was missing, more than $1.45 million was believed to have been transferred to Malaysia, the court heard.
Senior Constable Conor Healy told the judge that Singer "may have access to outstanding funds that have not yet been recovered", while prosecutor Peter Botteros argued that Singer posed an "unacceptable" flight risk because he Lives without a visa, has no family in Australia and was unemployed before his arrest.
However, Judge Daniel Holder decided that was not enough to send Singer to jail. Instead, he explained that confiscating Singh's Indian passport and preventing him from applying for a new one at the Indian embassy was enough: "If the condition was that he didn't have a passport or he didn't apply for a passport ... how did he manage to escape the country?"
Singh faces a string of theft charges along with his partner Thevamanogari Manivel, the owner of the bank account where the funds were transferred. Both pleaded not guilty to the charges. They go on to claim they rightfully won $7 million through the Crypto.com contest. Although the incident occurred in May 2021, it was not discovered until the annual audit in December 2021.
The Singapore-based cryptocurrency exchange has launched a civil action in the Supreme Court of Victoria to recover damages. The Victorian Supreme Court ruled the funds must be returned to the company.
