The wife of Russian Ilya Lichtenstein, Heather Morgan, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for assisting her husband.
In 2023, Lichtenstein and Morgan pleaded guilty to laundering billions of dollars in stolen Bitcoin.
Lichtenstein was sentenced to five years in prison. Morgan was sentenced to 18 months for helping her husband conceal the theft, the Washington Post emphasizes.
Lichtenstein and Morgan decided to get married in 2019. The Russian told his wife about the theft the following year and asked for help in hiding the income.
The couple used some sophisticated money laundering techniques to hide their income.
The value of the stolen bitcoins in 2022 was estimated to be $4.5 billion. Liechtenstein hid some of the money or converted it into gold.
Police seized the bulk of the stolen bitcoins during the arrest.
About 96 percent of the funds have been returned, lawyers said.
For reference
A prison is a place where people are kept in confinement and are usually deprived of a range of personal freedoms.
