BitMEX insider Dwyer agrees to US extradition after hiding out in Bermuda
First BitMEX employee Gregory Dwyer has agreed to extradition to the United States, where he faces criminal charges for allegedly breaking the Banking Secrecy Act (BSA), reports The Royal Gazette.
Dwyer is the last remaining BitMEX insider wanted by US authorities to surrender. According to his lawyers, Gregory Dwyer intends to defend himself against “meritless” charges.
As Protos noted in July, Dwyer was believed at-large somewhere in Bermuda since the US Department of Justice (DoJ) indicted the 38-year old Australian alongside three other BitMEX execs last October.
Dwyer must now hand over his passport and remain on the island.
The Southern District of New York initially requested to extradite Dwyer six months ago, in July. Authorities had so far failed to negotiate a voluntary surrender.
Co-founders Ben Delo and Arthur Hayes handed themselves in earlier this year. The latter negotiated his surrender in Hawaii from Hong Kong, where he resides.
Both pleaded not guilty to breaking anti-money laundering laws (AML) and violating the BSA. They were respectively released on $10 million and $20 million bonds.
Police arrested chief technical officer Samuel Reed in Massachusetts shortly after going public with the charges. Reed’s now out on $5 million bail.
Dwyer was the BitMEX man in Bermuda
Dwyer moved to Bermuda in 2019, having worked as BitMEX’s head of business development out of the company’s Manhattan offices.
BitMEX opened offices in the tax haven a year earlier.
The Seychelles-registered exchange was the first to offer “perpetual futures contracts,” which allow leveraged bets on crypto price movements.
Authorities allege execs intentionally left BitMEX open to money launderers and traded against customers to mitigate losses.
Read more [Arthur Hayes’ surrender starts countdown ’til court hears the coconut quote]
According to the DoJ, Dwyer was complicit in failing “to establish, implement and maintain an adequate anti-money laundering programme, including an adequate customer identification programme.”
The trial against the BitMEX four is set to begin in March next year. Each of their charges carry maximum sentences of five years in prison.
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[H/T: The Age]