Jailed Fraudster Charged With Moving $290K in Forfeited Crypto From Prison

A Bulgarian man already serving time for one of the larger crypto laundering cases prosecuted in the U.S. has been charged with pulling off another scheme from inside federal prison, allegedly moving $290,000 in cryptocurrency that a court had ordered him to forfeit.

Rossen Iossifov, 53, made his first court appearance in the Eastern District of Kentucky this week on charges of removing property to prevent seizure, aiding and abetting, and conspiracy to commit money laundering, the Department of Justice said in a statement. Prosecutors allege that in January 2024 he conspired to withdraw and transfer the forfeited crypto through several exchanges and mixing services, which pool funds to hide their trail, to keep the money out of the government’s reach.

Defendants who “flout lawfully entered orders” from earlier cases will be charged for that obstruction, said Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. The U.S. Secret Service, which investigated both cases, called the alleged transfers a “direct challenge” to the courts and to his victims.

The RG Coins case

Iossifov owned and ran RG Coins, a cryptocurrency exchange based in Sofia, Bulgaria, and was convicted in 2021 of racketeering and money-laundering conspiracies for his role in the Alexandria Online Auction Fraud network. The Romanian ring posted fake listings for cars and other high-value goods on sites like eBay and Craigslist, collected payments from at least 900 American victims, and funneled the proceeds to overseas launderers, with Iossifov converting the crypto to cash at the end of the chain.

Trial evidence showed he laundered nearly $5 million in cryptocurrency in under three years. He was ordered to pay more than $2.6 million in restitution and to forfeit the crypto now at the center of the new case, and was serving a 111-month term when the alleged transfers took place.

If convicted on the new charges, Iossifov faces up to 25 years in prison on top of his current sentence. The Justice Department’s computer crime section, which handled the prosecution, says it has secured convictions of more than 180 cyber and intellectual-property criminals since 2020 and court orders returning over $350 million to victims.