{"id":38426,"date":"2021-03-05T22:55:02","date_gmt":"2021-03-05T20:55:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/?p=38426"},"modified":"2025-08-30T04:36:42","modified_gmt":"2025-08-30T01:36:42","slug":"john-mcafee-faces-up-to-100-years-in-prison-on-fraud-and-money-laundering-charges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/john-mcafee-faces-up-to-100-years-in-prison-on-fraud-and-money-laundering-charges\/","title":{"rendered":"John McAfee faces up to 100 years in prison on fraud and money laundering charges"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">The entrepreneur John McAfee faces seven counts of fraud and money laundering. The case will be heard in the Southern District of New York.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\\\"twitter-tweet\\\">\n<p dir=\\\"ltr\\\" lang=\\\"en\\\">John David McAfee and executive adviser of his cryptocurrency team indicted in Manhattan federal court for fraud and money laundering conspiracy crimes <a href=\\\"https:\/\/t.co\/A96USZb6pC\\\">https:\/\/t.co\/A96USZb6pC<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 US Attorney SDNY (@SDNYnews) <a href=\\\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SDNYnews\/status\/1367877283726303233?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\\\">March 5, 2021<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\\\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\\\" charset=\\\"utf-8\\\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">Another defendant in the case will be the executive adviser to the entrepreneur&#8217;s cryptocurrency team, Jimmy Gale Watson Jr., who was taken into custody the day before.<\/span> <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/sec-files-suit-against-john-mcafee-he-has-been-arrested\"><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">McAfee was arrested<\/span><\/a><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\"> in Spain in October 2020; he awaits extradition to the United States.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">The first charge concerns<\/span> <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/what-is-pump-and-dump\"><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">pump-and-dump schemes<\/span><\/a><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\"> for altcoins on Twitter. McAfee posted tweets promoting certain coins, driving their prices higher. Prosecutors say that members of his team exploited this, locking in profits.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">The second count concerns undisclosed compensation for participation in promoting <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/what-is-an-ico-and-can-you-profit-from-it\"><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">ICO<\/span><\/a><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">\u00a0<\/span><i>\\u201cMcAfee and Watson earned almost $2 million by using social media to carry out pump-and-dump schemes. They also used the same platform to promote the sale of tokens, without disclosing information about the compensation they received from ICO organizers. This brought them another $11 million,\\u201d<\/i> according to prosecutors.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">The proceeds were laundered through banking transactions with the involvement of an unnamed member of McAfee&#8217;s team.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">The maximum penalty for the seven counts could reach 100 years in prison. McAfee and the executive adviser to the cryptocurrency team could also be fined.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">In the summer of 2018, the entrepreneur vowed to fight the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) \\u201cto his last breath.\\u201d He called the regulator&#8217;s decision at the time to classify ICO tokens as securities \\u201cabsurd\\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">The next day after these statements, he said he had ceased working with ICOs and would not recommend them due to the SEC&#8217;s warning.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">In October 2020, McAfee said he was satisfied with how his <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/john-mcafee-in-prison-tweets-that-he-is-content\">days in prison<\/a> were progressing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\\\"font-weight: 400;\\\">For more on the entrepreneur&#8217;s unusual life and controversial reputation, read in a special <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/tax-evasion-ico-advertising-and-belize-flight-the-extraordinary-life-of-john-mcafee\">feature<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Subscribe to ForkLog&#8217;s channel on <a href=\\\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/channel\/UCC9FnXTC8_ENzaNSO5cHQ6g\\\" target=\\\"_blank\\\" rel=\\\"nofollow noopener\\\"> YouTube<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Prosecutors have charged entrepreneur John McAfee with seven counts of fraud and money laundering. The case will be heard in the Southern District of New York.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":38427,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"select":"1","news_style_id":"1","cryptorium_level":"","_short_excerpt_text":"","creation_source":"","_metatest_mainpost_news_update":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1162,1154,319,944,1930],"class_list":["post-38426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-court-cases","tag-crimes","tag-ico","tag-john-mcafee","tag-prosecutor-office"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"views":"24","promo_type":"1","layout_type":"1","short_excerpt":"","is_update":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38426"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38426\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38428,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38426\/revisions\/38428"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}