BTC
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A dark car park. The evening mist mixes with the smog of the big city and spreads over the asphalt. Katerina gets out of her car and heads towards the casino sign. She takes a step forward, but then stops and returns to the car.
Katerina sits in her car with the headlights off. Her phone flashes a red message from the bank: ‘Your card has been blocked.’
She presses her head against the steering wheel. Her hands are shaking slightly. Thirty minutes ago, she placed her last bet at the casino. But with roulette, her ‘lucky number’ didn't work. Her bank account is in the red, and on the seat next to her is an unopened bottle of fine wine.
Katerina raises her head. The keys to the gym and studio hang on the rear-view mirror. The business she had built over the years. Yesterday, her clients wrote to her on Messenger and asked: where are the workouts, where are the videos? She simply did not respond...
‘Is this the end?’ She realises that tomorrow there will be no more stories about motivation... ‘I thought I would get everything back... But I couldn't stop in time.’
Over the past year and a half, Kateryna has lost over a million US dollars, gambling not only her money but also her future. Her evenings were increasingly spent not in the gym or studio, but at tables in casino VIP rooms. Instead of fitness content, her iPhone almost always opened tabs for betting sites.
It all started when complaints began to come in to the police. Several clients claimed that they had transferred funds for personal programmes and training videos but never received the promised video materials. In addition, one of her business partners filed a lawsuit accusing her of illegally transferring funds from a corporate account to a personal account.
Proceedings have been initiated on the grounds of fraud involving a local fitness trainer who lost more than a million at a casino. In addition, she is suspected of fraud amounting to more than 8.48 BTC. The information has already been entered into the Unified Register of Pre-trial Investigations, and investigators and police are establishing all the details and conducting other necessary investigative actions. During the searches, a laptop, phones and documents were seized, and more than 15 victims were interviewed.
Investigators also suspect that Kateryna may have withdrawn some of the funds through cryptocurrency services in an attempt to avoid bank monitoring. That is why one of her electronic wallets was registered to third parties. The total amount of cryptocurrency sent as prepayment for non-existent video courses amounted to over $1,000,000.
A dark car park... Evening fog mixes with the smog of the big city and spreads over the asphalt. Katerina sits in her car with the headlights off.
