The U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has included a cryptocurrency wallet allegedly connected to a major international criminal organization on its list of Specially Designated Nationals.
On September 26, the U.S. Treasury Department announced that it had imposed sanctions on ten individuals, several of whom were associated with the Sinaloa Cartel. Among them is Mario Alberto Jiménez Castro, a Mexican national, who was added via an Ethereum wallet.
According to the Treasury, Jimenez-Castro, who reported to Deputy Chapitos, oversaw a money laundering operation that utilized methods like virtual currency and wire transfers to move proceeds from illegal fentanyl sales in the United States to the Ciudad Mexico Roya cartel leadership. He directed couriers in the United States to withdraw cash and deposit it into various virtual currency wallets for direct payment to Chapitos and reinvestment in fentanyl production.
As per Etherscan, the wallet currently holds around 0.018 Ethereum, which is equivalent to $28.22 at the time of writing. The most recent activity on this wallet occurred over 200 days ago. No other wallet addresses were subjected to OFAC's recent sanctions, which were imposed in response to illicit fentanyl trafficking contributing to the U.S. opioid crisis.
Brian Nelson, Treasury Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, stated, "Today's actions demonstrate that the Treasury Department and the Administration will continue to relentlessly target those who threaten international security and flood our communities with fentanyl and other deadly drugs."
These sanctions follow OFAC's imposition of sanctions on individuals linked to North Korea's Lazarus Group. The U.S. Treasury Department previously cited Lazarus as one of the reasons for adding cryptocurrency mixer Tornado Cash to the list of Specially Designated Nationals in August 2022. In August 2023, U.S. authorities arrested Roman Storm, co-founder of Tornado Cash, on charges related to money laundering and sanctions violations. The Treasury Department's actions against Tornado Cash drew criticism from many industry leaders and policymakers. Six individuals backed by the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase filed a lawsuit against the Treasury Department over the sanctions, although a judge largely favored the U.S. government in a summary judgment motion in August.
