WASHINGTON DC: The Singaporean man accused of stealing and laundering US$230 million worth of cryptocurrency will go on trial on Oct 6 in the United States. 

Malone Lam’s trial date was set after he appeared in court in Washington DC on Friday (Mar 7), wearing a green prison jumpsuit.

The 20-year-old had previously requested a “speedy” legal process. 

The prosecution expects to have a new indictment related to the case in the next 30 to 45 days, said Assistant US Attorney Kevin L Rosenberg. He added that he expects the trial to last around two weeks.

After the court hearing on Friday, one of his defence lawyers, Scott Armstrong, said in a statement to CNA: “Malone Lam looks forward to exercising his right to trial by jury in this case.”

Lam is being held in a prison in Virginia. More pre-trial hearings are expected in the coming months and he will have an opportunity to enter a formal plea at these hearings. 

Together with accomplice Jeandiel Serrano, Lam is accused of taking 4,100 bitcoins from a “high net worth investor” by pretending to be a Google support team member. 

US prosecutors have described the scam as "one of the largest cryptocurrency thefts from a private individual ... in the history of the United States".

Serrano, a 21-year-old from Los Angeles, did not appear in court.

For each offence, Lam faces up to 20 years in jail, a fine of up to US$250,000, or up to twice his gains from the scams.

SPENDING SPREE

The case has drawn interest in Singapore after news of Lam’s lavish spending from the alleged theft. 

He is said to have rented luxury homes, spent US$400,000 to US$500,000 per night at nightclubs in Los Angeles and Miami, as well as bought dozens of luxury cars that included custom Lamborghinis, Ferraris and Porsches.

Social media videos purportedly show him in nightclubs, gifting Hermes Birkin bags to models and influencers.  According to the indictment, Malone Lam goes by the online monikers “Anne Hathaway” and “$$$”.

He and Serrano allegedly sent “unauthorised Google account access” notifications to the victim in the week leading up to the theft.

They used proxy and virtual private network (VPN) services to make it appear as if the access attempts were coming from overseas. This laid the groundwork for the theft through “sophisticated social engineering”, according to court documents.

The court heard that on Aug 18, 2024, Lam and his accomplice called the victim, pretending to be Google support team members and telling the victim there had been a hack attempt on his account. The pair ultimately convinced the victim to provide the security codes to his account before Lam allegedly accessed the victim’s OneDrive and Gmail accounts to locate the cryptocurrency assets.

He also looked for additional information on the victim’s private accounts and found Gemini cryptocurrency exchange records, said court documents.

The conspirators agreed that one of them should call the victim back and pose as a Gemini security team member to convince the victim that his cryptocurrency accounts had also been compromised.

Initially, they allegedly convinced the victim to transfer about US$3 million of cryptocurrency to a crypto wallet controlled by Lam. They then asked the victim to download a remote desktop connection program for his own security. This program gave Lam and Serrano real-time access to the victim’s computer.

Serrano purportedly continued to manipulate the victim into opening several files, including those with private keys to over 4,100 bitcoin. While Serrano continued to speak with the victim, Lam used the access keys to steal the Bitcoin.

Full evidence being used by the prosecutors is yet to be released but is believed to include a hard drive, online chat screenshots and Lam’s smartphone.