- Attackers subjected elderly couple to two-day ordeal, police say.
- Gang reportedly demanded a $9 million ransom from a crypto industry figure.
- Suspects charged with organised crime.
Police in France have charged seven people suspected of carrying out a brutal assault that saw a crypto industry professional’s parents kidnapped and tortured by attackers who filmed the ordeal — and said they wouldn’t stop unless they were paid over $9 million.
The attack, in Haute-Savoie, followed an increasingly familiar and gruesome playbook.
The victims were “bound with heavy-duty tape,” and the attackers “inflicted a head wound” on the man, a retired doctor, officers told French newspaper Le Dauphiné Libéré. They also “cut his wife’s back several times” with a box cutter, police said.
The charges come as police say they are closing the net on gangs of attackers who use violence, kidnapping, and coercion to steal from crypto holders.
While police have had some success in their recent crackdowns, many suspects remain at large as crypto kidnapping cases continue to balloon in France.
Detectives in the affluent town of Versailles are still hunting three men accused of forcing a couple to send them about $1 million worth of Bitcoin at knifepoint. The charges follow the arrest of a teenager in relation to an attack in Saint-Genis-Pouilly, where another crypto influencer’s fathers was doused with petrol.
Two-day ordeal
The Haute-Savoie case began on January 14, when a gang of masked individuals burst into the retired couple’s house in a small, unnamed hamlet near Sallanches.
The gang reportedly abducted the duo and drove them to an unknown location. Their target was their son, who police said works in the crypto industry.
The attackers filmed themselves attacking the elderly couple, and threatened more violence if their son did not pay a $9.2 million ransom.
Police did not say if the couple’s son paid this ransom. But on January 16, the attackers released the couple near Montélimar, in the Drôme region.
The National Prosecutor’s Office’s organised crime department told Le Dauphiné Libéré the group of arrestees included six men and one woman.
All suspects are being held in custody, a spokesperson said.
They all face charges of criminal conspiracy, organised crime, money laundering, and extortion.
Police said the case remains active as detectives continue their search for possible accomplices.
Tim Alper is a News Correspondent at DL News. Got a tip? Email him at tdalper@dlnews.com.