Bitcoin Forum

Charlie Shrem
Vice Chairman

Currently serving as CEO and co-founder of BitInstant, one of the largest, earliest and well known alternative payment companies, Charlie used his position in both the old banking world and new alternative currency world to help pave the way for the Bitcoin economy to emerge in early 2011. Known in the Bitcoin and old hacker communities as 'Yankee', he is also founding member and current Vice Chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation. Along with Gareth Nelson, he found the need for a more secure, fast and convenient way of transferring funds between and within payment networks around the world and leads BitInstant through the complex compliance, licensing and regulations of the worldwide banking system.

https://bitcoinfoundation.org/about/board


Since "Mr Shrem is a founding member and the current vice chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation" has been arrested at JFK airport and charged with money laundering and drugs, How legitimate is the Bitcoin Foundation gonna look now?

;)
Now its the time for USA agents to revenge, Who is the next?

All Bitcoin Business is in fact less/more relating to SilkRoad, SilkRoad makes Bitcoin's sucess today

It's just about the timing to investigate this fact and get a reason to destroy Bitcoin, then arrest Mtgox/TradeHill/Bitinstant etc.. what will Bitcoin be without black market? Crash!

He better be stepping down ASAP.

He is now a cancer to the whole bitcoin community.

We now tune you in to the already ongoing thread, four threads away from this one. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=435054.0

Does this mean that anyone can be basically charged with money laundering  ???

Mark Karpeles is next.

That pig needs to be put in jail as well.

Anyone who knowingly buys or sells BTC for illegal reasons can be.

And another https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=435059.0 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=435059.0)

And another https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=435047.0 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=435047.0)

And so on https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=435089.0 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=435089.0)

And so forth https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg4778545#msg4778545 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg4778545#msg4778545)

Of course. "The powers that be" can do whatever the fuck they want. Didn't you know?

This is stupid charge unless they have explicit proof that he was part of some organized crime group.

Hopefully, he didn't left his coins on laptop too though, who would listen all those trolls and their crap about FBI coins sales :P

my question is ... is he had smoked "Obama" ? lol

DEA Drug Bust Prank!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgEoCmHeAsc

About money laundry ... what kind of temple u belong to ???

ps-[. religious temples are the best way to laundry money, legally ]

It sure sounds like they have lots of email evidence that he knowingly corroborated with BTCKing.

Seems like that to me!

Just because some criminals grabbed him and put him in a cage? Would you please stop all this nonsense? Smoking things and and selling things doesn't make one a criminal. And as for Charlie, I don't even think he was deliberately involved in trading with drug dealers, apart from maybe buying a tiny little bit of something.

He is a cancer, the bitcoin foundation cant be seen to bump shoulders with criminals, he is now officially a cancer!

CONFIRMED!

http://www.vocativ.com/12-2013/night-bitcoin-millionaire-proud-stoner-charlie-shrem/

Is this confirmed? With the US gov. trying to keep banks in check since the 2008 debacle one would think they had one eye on BTC. After all even HSBC wasn't safe from the gov. when they were laundering drug money Surely he must have known there was too much heat to do anything remotely illegal with BTC.

Somebody mentioned it before when Silkroad got busted you need street smarts to play criminal.

I was going to say that he was a bit short sighted travelling to america, but then I thought that if he stayed where he was out of their jurisdiction drones with rockets would soon be overhead killing innocents.

So now I see it was a brave move to give himself up.

Although this news seems bearish at first glance, it's actually quite bullish for bitcoin. The FBI/DEA have drawn the line in the sand and are pursuing folks who are engaging or supporting the sale of illegal drugs using bitcoins. They look at bitcoin as a morally nuetral technology that can have many different purposes, just like the internet. They'll crack down on drug use and bitcoin will look even better once it is less associated with illegal activities.

+1

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25919482

Looks like Mr. Shrem wasn't directly involved in something illegal. He is guilty for not notifying the Gov. about a suspicious buying of coins on bitinstant whatever that means.

After all, they've done such a good job at preventing drug purchases with fiat.

wow, even me could be his lawyer ... is there a movie script around (about) ?

He was:
http://rt.com/usa/bitcoin-operator-exchange-arrested-257/ (http://rt.com/usa/bitcoin-operator-exchange-arrested-257/)
(rt provides a link to the official statement from the justice department)

facing 25 years in a small room with a toilet and a desk (if lucky).

So let's say you own an exchange, and some criminal launders some money there you're pretty much fucked.

I doubt it's that simple, they're not stupid.

They obviously have some proof he was actually collaboration with someone that was hanging around SR.

It's similar charge like against that Liberty Reserve guy.

no, read the emails. he knew the guy was doing this and he was actually helping him to get around the company's monitoring system etc.

No.

Read the article plebs. Charlie allegedly:
1) Bought drugs on the internet (they got proof, apparently)
2) Operate an unlicensed money service business
3) Knowingly laundered money (they got proof, apparently)

You're in da office, baby!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgYBzlTqIHY

Let me ask you something, why the hell is bitcoin tanking after such an event if we have this entire economy behind it?

"Tanking"

I don't think that word means what you think it means.

"GOLD SLAMMED AS IT MOVES $5"

well 10% in a few minutes is pretty serious, even for us.

I can look back less than a month and see bigger moves for no apparent reason.

This thing isn't going to be stable for decades.

~6.25%, from which it's recovered to ~1.5%. Yawn.

Yeah the same thing happed after SR got busted so I guess we're up to da moon, right?

lol gox.

It looks like people aren't ready to make a major move in either direction. I'm sure the TA gurus know where we are headed though!

Neither, probably gonna chill here a bit, as we've been doing. Until gox farts its last fart or the chinapocalypse(tm) happens.

lol charlie, I feel so sorry for you.

From the Wired article:

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2014/01/bitcoin-exchangers-arrested/

The children can once again sleep soundly in America.




Ouch.

Wow. That sounds dangerous. What kind of lab does one need to infuse brownies with marijuana?

I think there'll be a few more arrests of this nature to come.

It'll be slightly ironic that some of the biggest holders of Bitcoin have been massively enriched and subsequently come under a level of scrutiny that they never counted on.

I guess back in 2010-11 it would've felt like your own private playground where regular laws didn't particularly matter. They do when your platform starts to go global.

When that 30$ bubble popped, it was only one US senator who demanded to shut bitcoin down. Six months falling prices and BTC lost 90%.

Now we are facing multiple armageddons.



If it were cocaine, he would be a reliable businessman.

tststs

Right, so point 14. e. of the charges states "Bitcoins are not inherently illegal and have known legitimate uses, but they are also known to be used to facilitate illicit transactions and to launder criminal proceeds, given the ease with which they can be used to move money anonymously."

imagine charly s. was trading apples. they busted him because:

he traded apples for dollars with someone,

who allegedly sold those apples to others,

who allegedly used apples to score drugs.



the feds are testing levels of support of the bitcoin community. if they get away with this, they own us. every bitcoin can be traced around some corners to silkroad. you are all criminals because some other people like getting high.  ::)

Seems like they have a pretty good case for money laundering, those emails say a lot.

You mean the ones where Mr. Shrem says they should be okay because they are following the rules?

25 years!!!!! and they give child molesters 8 years. What the hell.

No, the ones where Shrem is giving advice on how to structure cash deposits to avoid suspicion.