'Skilled Cash Launderer' Ordered to Pay UK $7.6M Over Zhimin Qian Case – Decrypt

The UK’s Crown Prosecution Service has advised the one-time financier and fixer of convicted Chinese language Bitcoin fraudster Zhimin Qian that he must pay again over $7.6 million (£5 million) or danger further jail time.

Sen Hok Ling, a Malaysian nationwide described by the CPS as a “skilled cash launderer,” obtained 83.7 BTC from Qian between February and April 2024, which he cashed out in United Arab Emirates-based financial institution accounts and thru third events who transformed it to money.

“Ling took half in a classy cash laundering operation which laundered many thousands and thousands of kilos from the proceeds of crime,” mentioned Adrian Foster, Chief Crown Prosecutor of Crown Prosecution Service Proceeds of Crime Division, in a press release.

“We have now at the moment secured a Confiscation Order towards him of over £5 million, which he should pay inside 3 months or danger being returned to jail for an extra sentence of eight years.”

Ling was sentenced to 4 years and 11 months in jail in November 2025 after pleading responsible to at least one rely of a cash laundering associated offence. He was sentenced alongside Qian, also called Yadi Zhang, who obtained 11 years and eight months following a responsible plea for 2 cash laundering offences.

Zhimin Qian’s Ponzi scheme

Between 2014 and 2017, Qian ran a Ponzi scheme in China by an organization known as Lantian Gerui, largely concentrating on aged Chinese language traders. The scheme conned 128,000 individuals out of pensions and life financial savings, many lured in with elaborate banquets and roadshows, in addition to company on the occasions such because the son-in-law of Chairman Mao. Payouts stopped in 2017. Qian transformed a few of her ill-gotten beneficial properties in crypto and fled the nation.

She arrived within the UK with a passport underneath the identify Yadi Zhang and set about reinventing herself. She tried to money out the Bitcoin and buy high-end London properties however discovered herself blocked by know-your-customer necessities, in the end renting a $21,000-a-month mansion in Hampstead Heath, London as a substitute.

At the moment, her diary confirmed her plotting to rub shoulders with European aristocracy, musing over shopping for a Swedish fort, changing into mates with a duke and buying a British financial institution. She additionally harbored ambitions to turn out to be “Queen of Liberland,” referring to an unrecognized microstate within the Danube river the place Tron founder Justin Solar is prime minister.

Her machinations have been, nevertheless, reduce quick when she was arrested in York in April 2024. Raids on her Hampstead mansion uncovered 61,000 BTC, the biggest crypto seizure in UK historical past.

The UK’s $5.4 billion Bitcoin haul

What to do with the cash—at the moment price $5.4 billion—stays the topic of debate. Buyers in Lantian Gerui didn’t pay in crypto and are estimated to have misplaced a mixed complete of $600 million, a fraction of the Bitcoin’s present worth.

Civil proceedings are ongoing to resolve how the Bitcoin will likely be disbursed. Whereas victims will have to be reimbursed, the extra funds might find yourself within the UK Treasury.

Nick Harris, CEO at Crypto Asset Restoration Agency CryptoCare, advised Decrypt that the UK’s Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 empowers authorities to grab funds from fraud even when they originate abroad. “The legislation permits the UK to retain such funds, usually directing them to the Treasury or legislation enforcement,” he mentioned.

Following the fraudsters’ sentencing, Harris beforehand instructed the UK may set up a strategic reserve with the funds, “strengthening its place within the world crypto economic system whereas supporting victims by separate compensation mechanisms.”