$40.7 Million Fine: Judge Rules Ponzi Scheme on Bitcoin Savings and Trust

There are several high profile criminal and civil cases involving Bitcoin in the United States. In some of these the prosecution is clearly applying law to Bitcoin transactions that might not apply. But in the case of Trenton Shavers and his Bitcoin Savings and Trust this turned out not to be the case, even though his attorneys tried to make it look like it.
A US Federal Judge has ruled in case is SEC v. Shavers et al, U. S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas, No. 13-00416 that the Bitcoin Savings and Trust was indeed a criminal enterprise and Shavers was guilty of running a Ponzi Scheme.

This post was published at Coin Telegraph on 2014-09-22.