Federal police officer William Wheatley is accused by Australia’s National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) of taking 81.62 Bitcoin, or almost $4.2 million, from a Trezor hardware wallet that was found during a drug bust in 2019.
Authorities claim that 81.62 Bitcoin, worth $309,000 at the time, were initially stored in the hardware wallet. But according to detective Deon Achtypis, Wheatley was connected to the money transfer soon after the raid using cryptocurrency tracking software.
When the recovery seed phrase for the wallet was found on the scene, police initially thought a member of the crime organization had erased the Trezor. However, analysis of IP addresses identified Wheatley as the offender.
Despite being accused of theft, money laundering, and abusing his position as a public official, Wheatley continues to assert his innocence. The purported Bitcoin pilfering coincides with Trezor revealing a new security breech affecting 66,000 users.
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