Carlos Ghosn’s $600K Bitcoin Escape Fee Paid via Coinbase
Carlos Ghosn's son paid approximately 63 bitcoin, now worth $608,000, to the two men who smuggled his father out of Japan last December.
Jul 24, 2020 at 11:44 a.m. UTCUpdated Feb 6, 2023 at 1:16 p.m. UTC
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The son of former Renault and Nissan head and fugitive Carlos Ghosn used Coinbase to pay two men $600,000 in bitcoin to get his father out of Japan in December.
- U.S. prosecutors said Wednesday that Anthony Ghosn sent 63 bitcoin to Michael and Peter Taylor, a father-and-son team who smuggled Carlos Ghosn out of Japan on Dec. 30, 2019.
- Coinbase gave evidence to Japanese investigators this week (see below), showing a series of transactions between January and May 2020 from Ghosn's Coinbase account to one belonging to Peter Taylor.
- Ghosn transferred what was then worth $500,000 of bitcoin to Taylor in seven transactions – the 63 bitcoin would now be worth $608,000.
- Michael Taylor, a former Green Beret soldier, and Peter Taylor are currently being held by U.S. authorities at the request of Japan, which is trying to extradite them.
- U.S. prosecutors filed the evidence in opposition to the Taylors' bid to be released on bail.
- Wednesday's filing shows a bank account managed by Peter Taylor also received two wire transfers, totaling over $870,000, from Carlos Ghosn's account in October 2019.
- Ghosn was arrested in November 2018 on allegations of false accounting and then of shifting a personal loss of $16.6 million onto Nissan's books.
- Pleading innocent, Ghosn was held under house arrest for more than a year until his escape.
- In December, he was smuggled out of the country in a double-bass case by the Taylors, who pretended to be a band playing at a dinner party.
- Ghosn is now hiding out in his childhood home of Lebanon, having accused the "rigged" Japanese justice system of denying his basic human rights.
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See the Coinbase evidence below:
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