A party boy who loves BTC
In 2012, the man in the picture stole an amount of Bitcoin valued at $5.5 Billion today his name is James Zhong And the story that you are about to see below gives to create a series of five seasons Robberies, parties, drugs, luxuries … and more things that you will discover.
James Zhong, or better known as Jimmy Zhong, was born on May 24, 1990 in Georgia, United States Despite being born into a middle-class family, he had a pretty tough childhood, as he suffered a lot of bullying in the schools where he went He was a very shy, lonely and insecure boy. In 2008 he entered the University of Georgia to study computer science, which was his passion and what he was best at Two years later he discovered Bitcoin and decided to specialize in this, especially in mining Before continuing, you need to know what Silk Road is It was a dark net site where you could buy anything illegal you could imagine. Purchases were mainly made with BTC, to ensure anonymity Now yes, we follow Jimmy, in 2012 he was on Silk Road and discovered a bug that would allow him to generate a lot of free Bitcoin Instead of reporting it in exchange for compensation, he decided to go to the dark side It is said that he spent up to three years taking advantage of this error, he did not stop withdrawing a lot of bitcoins that were not his. He created several accounts and withdrew them to many different wallets, to ensure more anonymity and security.
Once he managed to steal those Bitcoins, he used Mixers to make the trail of those coins disappear and in this way he could spend the Bitcoins without anyone finding out, valued today at $5,500,000,000 At the time of the theft, the value was about $600,000, a very high figure, but nowhere near what it is today Good old Jimmy decided to hide all the keys to his wallets around his house, even inside a jar of Cheetos popcorn In those moments began the rise and fall of his life. He lived the American dream but at extreme levels. He started exchanging Bitcoin for Dollars to start spending them. But he only had one thing on his mind, to be the coolest of all and to be noticed by others, especially girls. Since then, Jimmy spent huge millions on cars, clothes, watches, private parties, yachts, dr*gas… He had a luxurious dream life, minus a couple of things, of course He started to be extremely successful on a social level. He went from being the shy guy who was laughed at to the colleague everyone wanted to have. But the most important thing for him was that he went from not talking to any girl to suddenly dating a lot of different ones. He felt special and loved for the first time in his life His life was based on partying brutally, buying luxuries and being with his new friends According to a friend he had, he spent all day bragging about his luxuries and his black card, which is a credit card that only big fortunes have When someone asked him what he did for a living, Jimmy replied that he mined Bitcoin at the beginning of it all, that’s where he got all his money In 2016 he had his first scare.
He was arrested for possession of c0caine. As I mentioned before, he was spending some of the money on dr0gas to give away or use at parties he organized Finally, nothing else happened. He went on with his luxurious life as if nothing mattered Until in 2019, he made the most expensive mistake of his life. A very silly mistake that ended it all On a random night, his house was broken into and a briefcase with $4,000 in cash and a device was stolen. And he had no better idea than to call the police… Who went to his house and realizing that he had the briefcase very hidden, began to suspect why he had so much money in cash and hidden…
They started an investigation Until in 2021, as a curiosity, just the day before the Bitcoin ATH, the FBI went to Jimmy’s house where they found all kinds of luxuries, more than 600. 000 in cash, gold and silver bullion… and most importantly, billions of dollars in Bitcoin Jimmy confessed it all, he had no problem telling. In fact, he told the judge that he knew what he was doing was wrong, but that period of lust made him feel important and worth something… It’s sad to see how there are people who have suffered so much mentally and need external validation to feel valuable Finally, he was sentenced to 1 year in prison.
A much criticized amount. Some defend that it is too little, since he stole a gigantic amount of Bitcoin On the other hand, most defend that it is a lot because he stole that money from criminals, they were Bitcoins from Silk Road users and when he was caught he “returned” almost all of them And you, what do you think? Is it a lot or a little?
