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TYLER, Texas – U.S. Attorney Brit Featherston of the Eastern District of Texas announced the court sentenced a Virginia woman to federal prison for her role in a cryptocurrency money laundering conspiracy.
Lois Boyd, 76, of Amelia Court House, Virginia, pleaded guilty on June 14, 2022, to interstate travel in aid of racketeering enterprises and was sentenced to 37 months in federal prison today by U.S. District Judge Jeremy D. Kernodle.
According to information presented in court, Boyd was in a transnational money laundering network involved in laundering criminal proceeds derived from various fraud schemes. Boyd and her co-conspirators exchanged criminal proceeds for cryptocurrency and directed the cryptocurrency to wallets under the control of their foreign co-conspirators. For example, in August 2020, Boyd and her co-conspirators traveled to Longview, where they attempted to exchange approximately $450,000 in criminal proceeds for Bitcoin.
On June 16, 2021, a federal grand jury named Boyd in an indictment, charging her with interstate travel in aid of racketeering enterprises and money laundering.
On April 6, 2022, Boyd’s co-conspirator, Deependra Bhusal, 47, of Irving, was sentenced to 46 months in federal prison for his role in the cryptocurrency money laundering conspiracy.
This effort is part of Operation Crypto Runner, an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF) operation. OCDETF identifies, disrupts, and dismantles the highest-level criminal organizations threatening the United States using a prosecutor-led, intelligence-driven, multi-agency approach. You can find additional information about the OCDETF Program at https://www.justice.gov/OCDETF.
The U.S. Secret Service and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service investigated the operation. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Nathaniel C. Kummerfeld and L. Frank Coan, Jr., with assistance from the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section, the Department’s Office of International Affairs, helped prosecute the case.