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A pioneering cryptoasset recovery case has exposed an arguable failure by UK law enforcement to use powers already available under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002. Writing in NLJ this week, Ashley Fairbrother and Rhys Evans of Edmonds Marshall McMahon recount how their client, a US citizen duped in a devastating romance fraud, lost nearly $1m after being manipulated by a fake ‘Kensington-based diplomat’
Blockchain investigators traced around $800,000 in USDT to Tether-controlled wallets, but despite repeated requests, five UK agencies declined to act. Instead, a Californian police officer and the US IRS Criminal Investigations Division secured seizure warrants and ultimately recovered the funds.
The article champions Tether’s ‘burn-and-remint’ mechanism as ‘a standard tool of modern asset recovery’, and warns that British victims are being left to watch ‘their stolen pensions sit immobile on the blockchain’ while overseas authorities intervene.
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