Turkish Crypto Boss, Faruk Fatih Ozer Bags 11, 000 Years In Jail

The founder of the collapsed Turkish crypto exchange Thodex, Faruk Fatih Özer, his sister Serap Özer, and his brother Güven Özer, have been sentenced to 11,196 years, 10 months and 15 days in prison, Turkish media reports. A judicial fine of 135 million liras (almost $5 million) was also imposed.

Thodex, one of Turkey’s largest crypto exchanges, suddenly went offline in April 2021 and Özer went missing, leaving over 400,000 members in the dark without access to deposits of $2 billion in cryptocurrencies.

By April 2023, Özer was extradited to Turkey after being arrested in August 2022 in Albania after an Interpol red notice against him.

Özer bagged seven charges, including establishing and managing an organization with the purpose of committing a crime, being a member of an organization, fraud by using information systems as a tool of banks or credit institutions, fraud of merchants or company executives and cooperative managers, and laundering the value of assets resulting from crime.

Özer’s brother, sister and four other senior employees were jailed and at least 83 people were detained as part of the investigation in a trial that saw 21 defendants facing up to 40,564 years in prison.