Ahmedabad Court Hands Life Terms for 2018 BTC Extortion Plot
Ahmedabad’s anti-corruption court has sentenced 14 individuals—including 11 serving and former police officers and a former BJP MLA—to life imprisonment in India’s most prominent Bitcoin extortion case. The defendants orchestrated the 2018 kidnapping of businessman Shailesh Bhatt to seize his recovered 752 BTC and $3.6 million in cash at a farmhouse near Gandhinagar. During the Bitcoin extortion, Bhatt was forced to surrender 176 BTC and ₹32 crore, and accomplices sold another 34 BTC under duress. After a trial supported by 173 witnesses, they were convicted under the Prevention of Corruption Act and IPC provisions, receiving life terms, hefty fines and asset forfeiture. Separate probes also target Bhatt for allegedly abducting BitConnect promoters to recover over 2,000 BTC and 11,000 LTC. This landmark verdict underscores intensifying legal scrutiny of digital asset crime and police corruption in India.
Neutral
This verdict, while landmark in highlighting legal scrutiny of digital asset crime and police corruption, is unlikely to materially affect BTC’s market price. The case pertains to events from 2018 and involves recovered and seized bitcoins rather than market supply or major institutional adoption. Traders will view the outcome as reinforcing regulatory risk awareness but not altering Bitcoin’s fundamental supply-demand dynamics. In both the short term and long term, this news should have a neutral impact on BTC’s price trajectory.