Federal prosecutors said Wednesday they have returned $11.7 million to roughly 1,000 victims who invested with e-Bullion.com, an e-currency business once operated by a man convicted of arranging his wife’s murder in Century City.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the website operated for years as an illegal money-transmitting business.
The $11.7 million included bank funds and liquidated reserves of gold, silver and platinum seized from James Fayed and his companies — e-Bullion.com, Goldfinger Coin and Bullion, and Goldfinger Bullion Reserve Corp.
Fayed was arrested in 2008 on charges that he paid a former employee to orchestrate the slaying of his wife, Pamela Fayed, in a Century City parking garage.
He was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy in May 2011 in Los Angeles and sentenced to death.
According to federal prosecutors, authorities obtained information from e-Bullion’s and GCB’s encrypted computer servers in Switzerland. That information was used to identify e-Bullion account holders and the value of their individual accounts.
Last week, officials distributed the forfeited funds to account holders in several countries, including the United States, Australia and Canada, authorities said.
Online currency “is not beyond the reach of the law,” said Eileen M. Decker, the U.S. attorney in Los Angeles.
“The Department of Justice has recouped and will continue to recoup criminal proceeds for crime victims in the digital age,” she said.
