Henderson man pleads guilty in $722M crypto fraud scheme

A Henderson man pleaded guilty Thursday to laundering money as part of a $722 million cryptocurrency fraud scheme, according to the Justice Department.

Gordon Beckstead, 57, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in New Jersey to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering and one count of aiding in the preparation of a false tax return, the department said in a press release.

From April 2014 to December 2019 the BitClub Network solicited money from investors in exchange for shares of purported cryptocurrency mining pools and and rewarded investors for recruiting new investors into the scheme.

Beckstead was a BitClub Network investor and admitted to conspiring with others to launder more than $50 million. He also admitted to helping prepare false 2017 and 2018 tax returns for the scheme’s creator and operator, Matthew Goettsche. The returns failed to report more than $60 million in income earned through the scheme, allowing Goettsche to avoid paying more than $20 million in federal income taxes, according to the release.

Beckstead is due in court Aug. 9 for sentencing.

Anyone who believes they were the victim of the scheme can visit justice.gov/usao-nj/bitclub.

Contact David Wilson at dwilson@reviewjournal.com. Follow @davidwilson_RJ on Twitter.