Main suspect Qian Zhimin who fled with 61000 bitcoins appears in court in London and denies all money laundering charges

Coin World News Report:


According to foreign media reports, on October 21st local time, Tianjin Lantian Greenergy Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. (referred to as Lantian Greenergy) and Qian Zhimin (also known as Yadi Zhang), the main suspect in the largest Bitcoin money laundering case in the UK, pleaded not guilty to the charges of Bitcoin money laundering in the Southwark Crown Court in London.
The report mentioned above stated that the court accused Qian Zhimin of committing two money laundering crimes by holding and transferring illegal cryptocurrencies on or before April 23rd.
In April of this year, Qian Zhimin was arrested for involvement in a Bitcoin money laundering case. According to previous reports from The Paper, Qian Zhimin, after entering London, hired a Chinese-British woman named Jian Wen who worked in a local Chinese restaurant as her “frontman” to carry out a series of money laundering operations, including converting Bitcoin, purchasing jewelry, and multimillion-dollar mansions. However, due to the significant difference between Jian Wen’s declared income and her current level of consumption, as well as the unclear source of funds, it triggered the UK’s anti-money laundering procedures and attracted the attention of local police.
In May of this year, Jian Wen, 42 years old, was sentenced to 6 years and 8 months imprisonment by the Southwark Crown Court in London, on charges of assisting her employer in using Bitcoin for money laundering from October 2017 to January 2022. In this case, the UK police seized over 61,000 Bitcoins, the owner of which was Qian Zhimin. This case is also the largest-scale cryptocurrency money laundering case investigated in the UK.
In May of this year, the Chinese Newsweek reported that according to a British judicial document, these 61,000 Bitcoins were mainly purchased with the proceeds of Qian Zhimin’s criminal activities in China. Qian Zhimin is the owner and controller of Lantian Greenergy. After the Chinese police investigated Lantian Greenergy, Qian Zhimin fled China in July 2017 and arrived in the UK in September 2017 using a passport under the name of Yadi Zhang. In the UK, she hired a Chinese woman named Wen Jian to assist in money laundering.
In China, Qian Zhimin is also known by another name, “Huahua”. As early as the end of 2017, the Tianjin police announced that they had launched an investigation into the illegal absorption of deposits by Lantian Greenergy. Other relevant local public security agencies are also conducting investigations and filing cases.
Previously, Lantian Greenergy used the Internet, large-scale promotional events, and other means to launch more than ten financial projects under the guise of intelligent elderly care services, vigorously promoting zero risk and high returns, and using offline contract signing to illegally absorb deposits from the general public. “Give Greenergy three years, and Greenergy will give you three lifetimes of wealth and prosperity” was the promotional slogan of Lantian Greenergy at that time.
A judgment obtained by The Paper shows that from April 2014 to August 2017, Lantian Greenergy illegally absorbed more than 40.2 billion yuan, all controlled and disposed of by Qian Zhimin, of which more than 34.1 billion yuan was used to repay over 120,000 investors.