Dr. Ruja Ignatova is the only scammer who is on both the FBI and Interpol's 2022 Ten Most Wanted Lists. I had no clue that it could be false. While in Waltenhofen, we learned that she had a German husband, a lawyer for the well-known firm, Linklaters. THE FBI has added a Bulgarian woman dubbed the 'Crypto Queen' to its infamous 10 most wanted list after she stole billions in the biggest scam EVER. When you're dealing with a scam worth billions of euros, it's not unusual for shadowy groups to get involved. Lots of people were looking to get involved in this strange new opportunity. Maybe it's just a delay. Ms Ignatova disappeared on 25 October 2017 after being tipped off about intensifying police investigations into her OneCoin cryptocurrency. Frankfurt probably isn't the only place she goes - it might be one of several places, including perhaps Dubai and Russia. In October 2017, Ruja was scheduled to appear in a OneCoin promotional event in Lisbon, Portugal. McAdam started a Facebook support group for other defrauded victims of OneCoin. DeSantis won't say he's running. After Jennifer lost her money, she pursued Ignatova for six years and she was disappointed when the City of London police closed their investigation in 2019, saying they could not locate any assets of OneCoin or its founders in the UK. She told people she had invented a cryptocurrency to rival Bitcoin, and persuaded them to invest billions. "I can only deduce that it came from the circles that she was in and the connections that she had through a variety of influential personalities.". Up to 90 years for the Ponzi scheme. It meant Ignatova was kept out of public records and land registry deeds until now. Like this one at Wembley Arena in London in 2016. The documents show attendees from Bulgaria's Interior Ministry at the March 2017 Europol meeting. At the gated entrance to their mansion is a 10ft-high wrought iron gate with their names and the slogan "What dreams may come". ", The webinar hosts talked about Dr Ruja's glittering background: Oxford University, a PhD from Konstanz, a stint with the respected management consultancy, McKinsey and Company A speech Dr Ruja had given at a conference hosted by The Economist magazine was shown - and that's what clinched it for McAdam. "You will find her," he said. She earned a law degree from Oxford University and a PhD in private international law from. Following the success of Bitcoin and the subsequent explosion of its price, investors who bought early at a low price made huge returns. Bulgarian-born German citizen Ruja Ignatova, FBIs list of the 10 most-wanted fugitives. And every item of clothing is Dolce and Gabbana. Bang!". Daniel took me and Georgia to meet Prudence, who first introduced him to OneCoin. OneCoin was still growing fast, and Dr Ruja was starting to spend her new fortune: buying multi-million-dollar properties in the Bulgarian capital, Sofia, and the Black Sea resort of Sozopol. In 2020, it was announced that Jennifer McAdam will be portrayed by Kate Winslet in an upcoming Hollywood film about the OneCoin fraud. There were rumours of course - lots of them. I ask if he felt guilty, for having sold so many people a coin that didn't exist, and for having made so much money in the process. Black-and-gold shoes, black-and-gold pleated suit, black-and-gold shirt, black-and-gold sunglasses, and he has a thick black-and-gold ring on. Another tip he gives us is to find out where she has been on her yacht. But there was something very important these investors didn't know. The stranger was Timothy Curry, a Bitcoin enthusiast and cryptocurrency advocate. They are now in what's called my downline. Video, At the crash site of 'no hope' - BBC reporter in Greece, Record numbers of guide dog volunteers after BBC story. I will double your coins, I will double your coins. he shouts. Some are running because they got loans from a bank. And if you get in early, there's the chance to make a fortune. He takes the first one on the list and looks it up on the Companies House website. She started planning holidays and shopping trips. Ruja Ignatova and her business partner Sebastian Greenwood conned their clients out of $4 Billion. But when Daniel found out about OneCoin, it suddenly seemed like a much better alternative. This proved to be fraudulent and she was sentenced to 14 months suspended jail sentence. The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. In the FBI's' 72-year history, Ruja is only the 11th woman to appear on this list. "When you look at my clothes, they are disciplined," he says. On the other hand, Ruja and her collaborators amassed millions, which provided them with an affluent lifestyle: they bought luxury yachts, expensive jewelery and exclusive properties. "Maybe you can tell her Maybe" he says. The book is called The Missing Cryptoqueen: The Billion Dollar Cryptocurrency Con and the Woman Who Got Away With It. Reluctantly, she agreed to a conversation on Skype. [25] The FBI followed up with an episode of its podcast and YouTube series Inside the FBI devoted to Ignatova and the OneCoin case. Why did the FCA drop its Cryptoqueen scam warning? There is a BBC Sounds podcast called "The Missing Cryptoqueen." According to the BBC in an article dated July 2, 2022, Ignatova stashed millions of dollars in the rival Bitcoin before disappearing in 2017. According to Bjercke, Dr Ruja never expected OneCoin to grow so big. Nobody knew why she wasn't there," recalls one delegate. The inescapable conclusion was that those rising numbers on the OneCoin website were meaningless - they were just numbers typed into a computer by a OneCoin employee. "I'm devastated for all the UK victims," Jen McAdam told me, when she heard the news. London, June 11, 2016. In fact, OneCoins were entirely worthless, he said, per CNN. But in January 2017 it was shut down permanently. They don't have a blockchain today. Ruja's ambition was to create a cryptocurrency to rival Bitcoin for the ordinary person who was not an experienced investor, but who could invest a smaller amount of money and make a considerable profit. I explain that this is probably beyond my abilities (apart from being illegal). The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking. He thought OneCoin would give cryptocurrencies a bad name, and he told McAdam bluntly that it was a scam - "the biggest scam in the [expletive] world". She told the cheering crowd that OneCoin was on course to become the world's biggest cryptocurrency "for everyone to make payments everywhere". [19], In 2022, prosecutors in Darmstadt, Germany confirmed an investigation of "a lawyer from Neu-Isenburg" for possible money laundering: the transfer of 7.69 million euros by Ignatova into one of her private accounts in 2016. (Her) lies were designed with one goal, to get everyday people all over the world to part with their hard-earned money.. 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Now a hit podcast is stepping up the search for the international scam artist, writes Tanya Sweeney "The problem is that when you create this company, no-one checks any of the information provided." The 16th century English buccaneer Sir Francis Drake died without heirs and this has inspired many to search for his supposed fortune, and others to swindle fortune hunters. "I felt responsibility. His colleagues - also private investigators - visited top-end restaurants in Athens armed with photos of Ruja, and in one of them several waiters claimed to clearly remember her dining there earlier this year. She is best known as the founder of a fraudulent cryptocurrency scheme known as OneCoin, which The Times has described as "one of the biggest scams in history". The BBC asked the ministry whether its staff could be responsible for the leak, but it did not comment. But they have always failed because no-one could trust them. I don't want those people I introduced into OneCoin to see me moving around. It wasn't just a fake cryptocurrency, it was an old-fashioned pyramid scheme, with the fake coin as its "product". In 2016, Ms. McAdam had been in bed due to a chronic illness and she was unable to work. "When you talk about the amount of money that's been put into OneCoin of course there's people out there who are pissed off and would do anything to shut anyone like me up," says Bjorn Bjercke, the blockchain expert who discovered there was no blockchain, and started talking about it publicly. A change in the rules of Companies House the UK equivalent of ASIC forced Ignatova out of hiding, as she had to be named in full rather than just her shell company. Its working title is Fake! She was entered into a Whatsapp group, with its own "leader" who disseminated information from the headquarters in Sofia. He didn't get it, and in December 2017 he quit. When Georgia and I called them ourselves to check, they confirmed it. OneCoin was a familiar scam with a digital twist - a new and hugely successful take on the old pyramid scheme. Both companies were founded by Ignatova and Greenwood. Will she get her money back? A court reporter was there to hear his testimony, and according to his account of the proceedings Ignatov appears to have implied that his sister had duped him with the same line the organisation put out to its investors - that OneCoin critics were "haters" who could not be believed. Today doors are locked. The narco-boss is said currently to reside in Dubai, having evaded Bulgarian authorities. Even Google - 'Don't listen to Google!'" The listing of a property in the heart of London has brought a notorious cryptocurrency fugitive who ran a $4 billion Ponzi scheme out of the woodwork. This platform was launched after many delays. One week later McAdam bought a "tycoon" package, for 5,000. [27][28], Ignatova was married to the German lawyer Bjorn Strehl, with whom she had a daughter in 2016.[2][29]. She tried to close it down, he says, but the dark forces wouldn't let her. The FCA said it had been up for long enough, but OneCoin promoters presented this as proof that the UK authorities considered OneCoin a legitimate investment. ", Such explanations don't offer much comfort to those affected. James Richard Shinn was a book lover. From a tiny fragment of a poster advertising a tennis tournament, an expert identified the park in which one photograph was taken. "You're in at such an early stage and it's just going to go like Bitcoin. Everything is meant to be transparent - the website contains the details of every company in the UK. Maybe 1,000 wasn't enough? We also learned that Dr Ruja had a daughter in late 2016, and that she remained very close to her. Charles Ponzi is remembered for creating the Ponzi scheme. Fairly soon Igor Alberts was making more than 1m a month from OneCoin, which quickly became the biggest product in network marketing. There are also investors who feel guilty. In general, people are tempted by the idea of making huge profits fast. On the same day he was arrested, the FBI declared OneCoin a fraudulent currency. The now 42-year-old is thought to hold both Russian and Ukrainian passports and use a fake ID. Investors might not have understood the technology, but they could see her talking to huge audiences, or at the Economist conference. Dr. Ruja Ignatova, 41, pictured here in 2015, is wanted by Interpol because they say she cheated people who wanted to invest their money in cryptocurrency. The US lawyer prosecuting Ignatova, Damian Williams, released a damning statement last month where he said her crypto tokens were useless. The Rothschild family (/ r (s) t a l d / ROTH(S)-chylde, German: [ot.lt]) is a wealthy Ashkenazi Jewish family originally from Frankfurt that rose to prominence with Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1744-1812), a court factor to the German Landgraves of Hesse-Kassel in the Free City of Frankfurt, Holy Roman Empire, who established his banking business in the 1760s. Men are drinking champagne from the bottle, everyone is eyeing us in a way that makes us feel very uncomfortable. She now runs Whatsapp support groups for OneCoin investors who realise they have been swindled. I am simply a concerned person who cannot tolerate injustice in any form. There were limitations as to how many OneCoins could be exchanged for any other currency per day. Ruja Plamenova Ignatova (Bulgarian: , romanized:Rua Plamenova Ignatova; born 30 May 1980) is a Bulgarian-born German citizen and convicted fraudster. (And I, at the top, would be making a cut on all the sales. Money can buy a lot of friends, and I would imagine shes taking advantage of that.. Blame is not easy to apportion. Ruja Ignatova, also known as the "missing Cryptoqueen", received police information about investigations into her $4bn (3.5bn) cryptocurrency fraud before she disappeared, it is claimed. Several of the people Georgia and I interviewed spoke darkly about mysterious people and connections they didn't want to name. That's the most important thing of all," he says. Then he tries checking the company's owners. It wasn't a place we'd previously thought of looking. "That's what they call it. VIA HACHETTE BOOKS. Whether it's Bank of England notes and coins, shells, precious stones or matchsticks - all of which have historically been used as money - it only works when everyone trusts it. On October 25, two weeks after the Lisbon event, she boarded a Ryanair flight from Sofia to Athens, Greece. Beginning in . I don't want to be the person that breaks the news to Daniel's mother. What's he waiting for? This is also where Dr Ruja's husband - or perhaps ex-husband - lives and works. They were simply recording their transactions internally. Dr Ruja identified several of society's weak spots and exploited them. At first she was told it was something she didn't need to know, but when she persisted she finally got the truth in a voicemail in April 2017. He points out that he spent millions buying OneCoin, possibly more than anyone else. One of the main OneCoin offices in Kampala is attached to a church. She studied at Oxford University and received a PhD in International Law from the University of Constance. asked Bjercke. Some are hiding. She had got hold of a "big passport", he said, and asked him to get her plane tickets to Vienna, then Athens. That's illegal That is an anonymous shell company, as anonymous as anything that you can buy anywhere in the Seychelles or Nevis or the Marshall Islands or Vanuatu.". More folk are going to promote this. It said the Missing Cryptoqueen podcast "will not present any truthful information and cannot be considered objective, nor unbiased". Do you know how they do so? [5][6], Since 2017, Ignatova has been on the run from various international law enforcement agencies. She left with a tremendous amount of cash, FBI spokesman Michael Driscoll added. Around the same time, the US authorities charged Dr Ruja in absentia for wire fraud, security fraud and money laundering. For its fans this is a revolutionary new form of currency, with the potential to sideline the banks and national currencies, and provide banking for anyone with a mobile phone. Others told us she was dead - which does remain a possibility. The alleged motive for the murder was to conceal the drug lord's involvement in the OneCoin scam. In November of the same year, he pleaded guilty to charges of money laundering and fraud. "She was on her way. Looking to get ideas for places to take our 3 year old while in Frankfurt. [21][22] An Interpol Red Notice followed. But it seems it's not just the promise of riches that keeps people believing. Cryptocurrency as an idea was just entering the mainstream. "Particularly if you have invested something, not only money, but belief, reputation, intelligence. She is thought to have undergone several plastic surgeries in order to alter her appearance. "They still exist", he says, in his garden near the village of Hay-on-Wye. "Once OneCoin was running above 10 million, 20 million, 30 million, something happened where she was unable to stop it," Bjercke says. Investors often told us that what drew them in initially was the fear that they would miss out on the next big thing. In 2016 it was here that 22-year-old Daniel Lienhardt came as he was scraping together the 700,000 Ugandan shillings ($250) he needed to buy a OneCoin starter package. She understood that truth and lies are getting harder to tell apart when there is so much contradictory information online. Do you know who to complain to when you are a victim of a Ponzi scheme or pyramid scheme? She started asking the leaders of her OneCoin group if there was a blockchain. he recalls. (She received a fine and a suspended sentence in October 2016.) They live in an enormous house in an affluent neighbourhood on the outskirts of Amsterdam. That meant that investors could no longer trade their OneCoins and retrieve their investments. Aliases: Dr. Ruja Ignatova, Ruja Plamenova Ignatova, Ruja P. Ignatova, "CryptoQueen" Date(s) . Ruja Ignatova, also known as the "missing Cryptoqueen", received police information about investigations into her $4bn (3.5bn) cryptocurrency fraud before she disappeared, it is claimed. It's hard to say.". She would urge and convince simple people to invest in OneCoin and not be left out of the huge potential profits. Read about our approach to external linking. He was arrested in March 2019 at LA Airport as he was about to board a flight to Bulgaria. You can also see more on the next episode of BBC Click. In court, US prosecutors alleged in 2019 that Mr Schneider was the one who provided her with confidential police information, although it is not clear if the allegations relate specifically to the leaked files seen by the podcast. She lives in a concrete house with a tin roof - five small rooms, a small television and a cooking area. Human error to blame for train crash - Greek PM, At the crash site of 'no hope' - BBC reporter in Greece. She was dressed, as usual, in an expensive. Sky Germany, the U.K.'s Channel 4 and super-indie Fremantle are backing a three-part doc series about the con, which was spearheaded by the mysterious Dr. Ruja Ignatova, who is still on the run . It was a Ponzi scheme. "One Coin!" She could hear the whoops and cheers of thousands of adoring fans in the background. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. OneCoin has always denied wrongdoing. Phil and Georgia both recruit two people, and then all four of them recruit two more, and so on. I felt proud of her.". So with Georgia Catt, producer of The Missing Cryptoqueen podcast, I went to see Oliver Bullough, an expert on what he calls Moneyland - the shadowy parallel world where criminals and the super-rich hide their wealth. According to the documents, the meeting was attended by the FBI, the US Department of Justice and the New York District Attorney. Do you know what agencies go after them? Greenwood was arrested in 2018. The reason so many people are excited by Bitcoin is that it solves that problem. The article follows the life of a woman who started with the best possible education and a gifted personality, but threw it all away by making the worst possible life choices. They, like almost everyone else involved, were convinced they were earning a fortune. Bjercke would get an apartment and a car - and an attractive annual salary of about 250,000. 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