Federal officer accused of stealing crypto associated with drug fortune

A Federal Police officer is currently on trial in the Melbourne Magistrates Court for opening his pockets of cryptocurrency seized from an online drug trafficking syndicate.

The committee hearing, presided over by Magistrate Malcolm Thomas, continues and the accused's lawyer argues that the case is “compelling”.

The raid on drug trafficking was announced

William Whitley, a currently suspended federal police officer, was indicted in December 2022. According to court documents, Wheatley is accused of stealing 81,616 bitcoins from a cryptocurrency wallet that was discovered during an investigation into drug and steroid trafficking through the postal system in January. 2019.

During the raids, law enforcement found materials that resembled steroids and an encrypted email service with payments in Bitcoin that were allegedly used for drug transactions. A Trezor-brand hardware crypto wallet was subsequently found and turned over to Icarus investigators.

About three weeks later, the Icarus Task Force, which led the raid, received permission from a judge to recover the digital wallet. Detective Sergeant Deon Achtypis of the Cyber ​​Crime Squad, who was called in to assist following the raid, was able to access the wallet on February 14 and discovered that 81,616 bitcoins had been taken from the wallet just after 5pm on January 29 – four days after the device was seized. .

The stolen money, estimated at around $450,000 at the time, was transferred to two more digital wallets before its traceability was lost. Today, the same amount of Bitcoin would be worth over $6.3 million.

Investigation shows the involvement of the officer

Investigators initially suspected he was an associate of drug dealers who orchestrated the money's movement. However, the case was reopened in 2021 when new tracking devices suggested the involvement of a police officer.

Detective Achtypis knew that one of the IP addresses in question was linked to the AFP headquarters in Melbourne, leading the police officer to suspect that he might be involved in the crypto transfer.

Craig Gillespie, a crypto investigator based in Wales, was hired by the Australian Law Enforcement Integrity Commission to track and trace the funds. Gillespie confirmed that between January 29 and April 11, 2019, 28 transactions were made from wallets on various crypto platforms. Some of these transactions are said to have come from funds deposited in Mr Whitley's bank account between 2019 and September 2022.

During the proceedings, AFP officer Jesse White He testified that he was the only federal police officer present at the January 25 search at Hoppers Crossing. When he discovered the crypto wallet, he was unaware of its nature and contacted Mr Wheatley. He was described as a “specialist” in the AFP's cybercrime unit for assistance.