Heather Morgan, the New York resident, has claimed to be many things: “a serial entrepreneur, prolific writer, irreverent comedic rapper, and investor in B2B software companies with high growth potential.” But her LinkedIn bio doesn’t mention anything about her alleged capability to help launder hacked cryptocurrency.
It has been reported that United States Federal Bureau of Investigation agents arrested Morgan (or was it her rapper alter-ego Razzlekhan?) and her husband Ilya Lichtenstein for allegedly conspiring to launder crypto connected to the 2016 Bitfinex hack that saw 119,756 Bitcoin (BTC) drained from the crypto exchange.
However, the pair has strongly proclaimed their innocence during a New York court appearance on Tuesday and were released on multi-million-dollar bonds. The 119,756 BTC stolen from Bitfinex was worth $72 million in August 2016 but is now valued at more than $5.1 billion.
The report said that since the 2016 hack, individuals connected to the stolen coins have periodically moved small amounts of BTC in separate transactions, leaving the bulk of the funds untouched. The US Department of Justice reported that it had traced 25,000 BTC of these transferred funds to financial accounts controlled by Lichtenstein and Morgan. Special agents were then able to gain access to and seize more than 94,000 BTC, worth $3.6 billion at the time, from Morgan and Lichtenstein after a search warrant allowed them to view files containing private keys to the wallet.
Likewise, according to the DoJ complaint, the pair is charged with laundering conspiracy and conspiracy to defraud the United States; however, they are not charged with carrying out the hack itself. The first charge can be punished by up to 20 years in jail and the second by five years. While Lichtenstein appears to be your run-of-the-mill tech entrepreneur, Morgan has a prolific presence on social media where you can find TikToks showcasing art pieces inspired by her Synesthesia and her “WEIRD AF” music videos.
According to her LinkedIn, she started her career working as an economist in Asia and the Middle East, including post-revolutionary Egypt following the Arab Spring. When she returned to California and eventually moved to Silicon Valley, she “became immersed in the tech startup scene.” In 2009, she founded a business-to-business company called SalesFolk, which specializes in cold emails.
Although she didn’t get started with her rapping career until 2018, she was clearly practicing her lines for some time.
Thus, the company’s slogan “be a goat, not a sheep!” has just the right balance of absurdity and cryptic philosophical reference that it’s a wonder it didn’t come straight from one of her tracks.
Source: Cointelegraph