A Turkish cryptocurrency CEO and his two brothers were sentenced to 11,196 years in prison each for cheating investors out of millions of dollars.
Faruk Fatih Ozer, 29, fled to Albania with investor assets in 2021 after his Thodex exchange abruptly failed.
In June, he was extradited to Turkey and found guilty of money laundering, fraud, and organized crime.
State media disclosed that Ozer told the court he would “not have acted so amateurishly” if his goal was unlawful.
“I am smart enough to lead any institution on Earth,” he said, according to Anadolu.
“That is clear in this company I founded at the age of 22.”
His sister Serap and brother Guven were both found guilty of the same crimes during the brief trial in Istanbul.
Such extreme prison terms have become prevalent in Turkey after the death penalty was abolished in 2004 to boost Turkey’s attempts to join the European Union.
Adnan Oktar, a TV cult preacher, was sentenced to 8,658 years in prison for fraud and sex offences in 2022. Ten of his followers were sentenced the same way.
Prosecutors had requested that Ozer be sentenced to 40,562 years in jail, the report said.
Turks began utilizing cryptocurrencies as a hedge against the lira’s depreciation, which began more than two years ago.
Thodex, created in 2017, was one of the country’s largest virtual currency exchanges.
Ozer rose to national prominence as a financial wizard and infiltrated the establishment by befriending significant pro-government personalities.
However, the platform abruptly collapsed in April 2021. Ozer went into hiding after his investor assets vanished.
He was caught in Albania last year on an Interpol international warrant and extradited after a lengthy legal process.
Turkish media said Ozer escaped with assets worth $2 billion (£1.6 billion).
The prosecutor’s indictment, on the other hand, estimates total Thodex investment losses at 356 million lira.
At the time of the exchange’s demise, that sum was worth approximately $43 million.
Because of rapid inflation and the lira’s collapse on international markets, the same sum is now worth around $13 million.
