Three Men Arrested for Impersonating Police in $5.3M UK Crypto Fraud

Three men have been jailed in the UK for a $4 million ($5.3 million) cryptocurrency scam in which they posed as police officers to convince victims to hand over their money – then spent the money on Rolexes, shopping and luxury holidays.

The trio called eight people claiming to be police officers, warning them that their cryptocurrencies were at risk, and asking them to share account details or transfer money they believed to be safe with the police, the Metropolitan Police said. words. The group created fake authentication websites, and the money was immediately stolen and blown through the complex network.

At Southwark Crown Court on Thursday, Anthony Ikenwe, 29, and Kevin Nwamma, 25, were each sentenced to six years for conspiracy to defraud and five years for money laundering, to run concurrently. Hamza Bashir, 23, was given three years and nine months for fraud and three years for theft, also to run concurrently.

Rolexes, Dubai and Maldives coins

Investigators found the men were living beyond the limit. One had a recorded income of £444 per year, yet the group bought a car worth around £60,000 with crypto, kept £500,000 in a safe deposit box in Dubai, and traveled to Thailand, Japan, Paris, Mykonos, Maldives and Seychelles.

They shopped at Harrods, Hermès and Louis Vuitton and regularly converted crypto to payment cards, according to the Met. Authorities linked more than 1 million crypto coins to wallets operated by Ikenwe, and found the stolen money flowing into a bank account linked to Nwamma’s high-profile trucking business. The luxury property found in the search was worth more than £26,000.

The case began when the victims came forward in January 2025. The Met’s Cryptocurrency Team said that it uses a data-driven approach – linking blockchain transactions, exchange records, messages, financial records and internet service provider data – to connect what were previously seen as separate crimes in a single organized network operating on multiple platforms and domains.

“This was a very difficult investigation into a group of people who took advantage of the trust of victims by impersonating police,” said Detective Inspector Geoff Donoghue of the force’s Cryptocurrency Unit, adding, “Criminals don’t need to be fooled – the police are keeping pace with technology.”

In November, police raided seven addresses across London and Essex, arresting three men and seizing valuables, cryptocurrency and 40 mobile phones. He also secured a £1 million bond for the victims. Ikenwe and Nwamma pleaded guilty in April, while Bashir denied involvement and stood trial, changing his plea on the eighth day after more evidence was presented.

Being like adults

Acting like the police has been a recurring thread in crypto crime. The closest parallel to the Met case came last year, when a The scammer is pretending to be the UK police stole $2.8 million in Bitcoin from the victim’s hardware wallet. In the US, fraudsters pose as Denver police assured the woman he missed a jury duty, then gave him Bitcoin ATM cash to get rid of a fake document – one of the biggest frauds the FBI says he’s ever committed. hit the Americans hard.

Sometimes fake officers come forward. In France, gangsters dressed like policemen caught two at the knife in the Bitcoin hack of $ 1 million, while in Ukraine, men pretending to be policemen were to be arrested for extorting $250,000 in Tether from a businessman.

The Met said it was still working with the UK and other countries to identify those involved in the attack and to return property to those affected.