France is holding six men and a woman following the kidnapping and torture of the cofounder of a global cryptocurrency company and his partner, prosecutors said on Saturday.
The seven, who could face long prison terms up to life, are among 10 people taken into custody late on Thursday as anti-gang investigators probe the case.
David Balland, a 36-year-old cofounder and former employee of Ledger — a world leader in security systems for crypto and digital assets — and his partner were taken from his home in Mereau in the Loire region early on Tuesday, Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau told reporters on Friday.
Photo: AFP
Another Ledger cofounder, Eric Larcheveque, alerted police to the kidnapping after receiving a video showing a mutilated finger belonging to Balland, and a ransom demand, a source close to the case said.
Police located and freed Balland on Wednesday, and he was taken to a hospital for treatment.
His partner, taken to a different location by the presumed kidnappers, was found tied up in a car.
Most of the suspects were already known to police for past criminal activities, but none had previously been involved in gang-related crime, prosecutors said.
The kidnappers asked for “a large cryptocurrency sum,” Beccuau said, without giving an amount, with part of it handed over during negotiations handled by police before most of the crypto assets were seized and frozen.
The seven — five of whom are aged 20 to 25 — were being held in pretrial detention. They face charges of gang-related kidnapping, acts of torture and armed extortion. Their lawyers have so far declined to comment.
Three others initially held have been released.
A total of 230 police and gendarmes were involved in the operation, including the GIGN elite tactical unit specializing in hostage situations, along with cryptocurrency experts.
Founded in 2014, French company Ledger is a so-called “unicorn” — a privately held start-up worth more than US$1 billion — and a world leader in digital wallets and vaults to safeguard crypto assets.
US President Donald Trump on Friday said Washington was “locked and loaded” to respond if Iran killed protesters, prompting Tehran to warn that intervention would destabilize the region. Protesters and security forces on Thursday clashed in several Iranian cities, with six people reported killed, the first deaths since the unrest escalated. Shopkeepers in Tehran on Sunday last week went on strike over high prices and economic stagnation, actions that have since spread into a protest movement that has swept into other parts of the country. If Iran “violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to
Auschwitz survivor Eva Schloss, the stepsister of teenage diarist Anne Frank and a tireless educator about the horrors of the Holocaust, has died. She was 96. The Anne Frank Trust UK, of which Schloss was honorary president, said she died on Saturday in London, where she lived. Britain’s King Charles III said he was “privileged and proud” to have known Schloss, who cofounded the charitable trust to help young people challenge prejudice. “The horrors that she endured as a young woman are impossible to comprehend and yet she devoted the rest of her life to overcoming hatred and prejudice, promoting kindness, courage, understanding
‘DISRESPECTFUL’: Katie Miller, the wife of Trump’s most influential adviser, drew ire by posting an image of Greenland in the colors of the US flag, captioning it ‘SOON’ US President Donald Trump on Sunday doubled down on his claim that Greenland should become part of the US, despite calls by the Danish prime minister to stop “threatening” the territory. Washington’s military intervention in Venezuela has reignited fears for Greenland, which Trump has repeatedly said he wants to annex, given its strategic location in the arctic. While aboard Air Force One en route to Washington, Trump reiterated the goal. “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security, and Denmark is not going to be able to do it,” he said in response to a reporter’s question. “We’ll worry about Greenland in
PERILOUS JOURNEY: Over just a matter of days last month, about 1,600 Afghans who were at risk of perishing due to the cold weather were rescued in the mountains Habibullah set off from his home in western Afghanistan determined to find work in Iran, only for the 15-year-old to freeze to death while walking across the mountainous frontier. “He was forced to go, to bring food for the family,” his mother, Mah Jan, said at her mud home in Ghunjan village. “We have no food to eat, we have no clothes to wear. The house in which I live has no electricity, no water. I have no proper window, nothing to burn for heating,” she added, clutching a photograph of her son. Habibullah was one of at least 18 migrants who died
RSS