The Cybercriminals Who Organized a $243 Million Crypto Heist
In the balmy late afternoon of Aug.25, 2024, Sushil and Radhika Chetal were house-hunting in Danbury, Conn., in an upscale neighborhood of manicured yards and heated pools.
Sushil, a vice president at Morgan Stanley in New York, was in the driver’s seat of a new matte gray Lamborghini Urus, an S.U.V.with a price tag starting around $240,000.
As they turned a corner, the Lamborghini was suddenly rammed from behind by a white Honda Civic.At the same time, a white Ram ProMaster work van cut in front, trapping the Chetals.
According to a criminal complaint filed after the incident, a group of six men dressed in black and wearing masks emerged from their vehicles and forced the Chetals from their car, dragging them toward the van’s open side door.When Sushil resisted, the assailants hit him with a baseball bat and threatened to kill him.The men bound the couple’s arms and legs with duct tape.
They forced Radhika to lie face down and told her not to look at them, even as she struggled to breathe, pleading that she had asthma.They wrapped Sushil’s face with duct tape and hit him several more times with the bat as the van peeled off.Several witnesses saw the attack and called 911.
Some of them, including an off-duty F.B.I.agent who lived nearby and happened to be at the scene, trailed the van and the Honda, relaying the vehicles’ movements to the police.
The F.B.I.agent managed to obtain partial license plate numbers.Danbury police officers soon located the van.
A patrol vehicle activated its emergency lights and tried to make a stop, but the driver of the van accelerated, swerving recklessly through traffic.About a mile from where the chase began, the driver careered off the road and struck a curb.Four suspects fled on foot.
The police found one hiding under a bridge and apprehended him after a brief chase.Within a couple of hours, the other three were located hiding in a wooded area nearby.
The police, meanwhile, found the shaken Chetals bound in the ba...