Brisbane bitcoin ATM seized as part of drug trafficking investigation

Police and customs raid cafe as part of investigation into alleged methamphetamine trafficking linked to Bandidos bikie gang
The first bitcoin automatic teller machine in Queensland has been seized as part of an investigation into an alleged drug trafficking network linked to the Bandidos bikie gang.
Police gang squad officers seized the ATM on Friday morning in a joint raid with customs officials at the Roastery cafe in South Brisbane.
They allege the cafe was the ‘commercial front’ for a multimillion-dollar methamphetamine trafficking network directed by a former leader of the Bandidos Brisbane Centro chapter.
Police are yet to determine whether bitcoin transactions – which have been accepted by the cafe as payment since it installed the machine in May – played any role in the alleged trafficking.
Superintendent Mick Niland said computer experts were ‘forensically examining the machine as we speak’.
The cafe owner, a 34-year-old South Brisbane man who owns a 12.5% share of the ATM, is charged with trafficking ice and cocaine over a three-year period.

This post was published at The Guardian on 17 October 2014 09.44 BST.