Two men accused of having kidnapped and tortured an Italian in a townhouse in Manhattan as part of a cryptocurrency extortion plot were released on bail.
John Woeltz, 37, and William Duplessie, 33, each received a deposit of $ 1 million Wednesday by the judge of the Supreme New York Criminal Court, Gregory Carro, according to an ABC News report. The two men would have pleaded not guilty to accusations, in particular kidnapping, assault and coercion.
The case stems from an crypto extortion incident which took place a few months earlier. On May 6, a 28-year-old cryptocurrency merchant aimed at Italy was allegedly abducted after his arrival in New York.
According to the prosecutors, the man was held hostage for weeks and subject to repeated torture while his captors tried to force him to reveal his Bitcoin identification information (BTC).
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Battered victim, shocked by son
The Manhattan district prosecutor’s office said the victim was beaten, shocked by sons, swirling and threatened to be thrown from a balcony. At one point, the men would have threatened to kill the victim’s family. The photos recovered by the investigators would have shown a firearm pointed on the victim’s head.
The victim managed to escape at the end of May after convinced one of the suspects to allow him to access his laptop, where he said that the password had been stored. When he was briefly unattended, he fled the apartment and asked for the help of a nearby traffic agent. He was hospitalized for injuries that corresponded to his account of restraint and mistreatment.
After the escape, Woeltz, who would have a cryptocurrency investor in Kentucky, was said to have been arrested on the spot. Duplessie, a Miami resident, went to the authorities a few days later.
A police excavation from the town house has revealed a cache of articles, including drugs, weapons, body armor and surveillance tools. The authorities also recovered evidence suggesting that the attack was meticulously planned. The next hearing date is set for October 15.
In relation: The Belgian court sentences three to the abduction of the woman of the cryptographic investor
Presumed kidnappers to wear ankle electronic monitors
The crime journalist Lauren Conlin, who attended the hearing, said in an article on Wednesday on X that Woeltz and Duplessie had to wear electronic ankle monitors, abandon passports and undergo a security inspection every 72 hours.
“Defense claims that it was a hazing and that the victim wanted to be part of the lifestyle and that it was simply 17 days of shenanigans,” she wrote.
The managers and investors of the cryptographic industry are increasingly looking for personal security services as a surge in kidnapping and ransom cases, in particular in France.
On May 18, the private company based in Amsterdam Infinite Risks International reported an increase in demands for bodyguards and long -term protection contracts against highly publicized figures in cryptographic space.
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