California Man Files Lawsuit Against Alleged Crypto Scammers Over 1K Theft

California Man Files Lawsuit Against Alleged Crypto Scammers Over $221K Theft

News | March 7, 2024 By:

On Thursday, February 29, 2024, California resident Nabil Dweib Salem filed a lawsuit against an individual going by the name Anna Asfahany and other unnamed defendants over the theft of cryptocurrency worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

According to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida, Salem alleges that Asfahany lured him into transferring his cryptocurrency holdings to a fraudulent trading website under false pretenses between March and May 2023. Salem claims Asfahany misrepresented that she could teach him successful cryptocurrency trading techniques and showed examples of high returns, encouraging him to send his crypto funds to the website coin-crypto.win.

However, the complaint states coin-crypto.win was not a legitimate trading platform, but a fake site set up to deceive users. After Salem began transferring funds from his account on Crypto.com, defendants posted fraudulent high returns on the site to convince Salem to keep investing more. By May, Salem believed his funds had grown over four million dollars, as reflected on coin-crypto.win, and he sent an additional $22,000 to cover “service fees.”

When Salem then tried to withdraw his assets, he found his funds were blocked and he could no longer contact Asfahany. The lawsuit alleges Salem’s assets totaling around $221,998 were stolen in the scheme. Through forensic analysis, Salem’s lawyers say they have tracked the stolen cryptocurrency to wallets at major exchanges including Binance, OKX, and Crypto.com now controlled by the defendants.

The complaint accuses Asfahany and other unnamed individuals and entities of conversion, unjust enrichment, and conspiracy. It requests the court impose a constructive trust over stolen funds held by defendants and order them to return the misappropriated cryptocurrency to Salem. The suit seeks damages, interest, costs, and other relief.

Please contact BlockTribune for access to a copy of this filing.