Under the guise of "you can get double the profit by joining the game with 1 FIL coin (virtual currency, FIL is the native token of Filecoin, Filecoin is a decentralized storage network based on blockchain technology), and you can get 4 times the team profit by developing downlines", they jointly established a special company, and through the self-developed App, they attracted more than 10,000 members from many provinces and cities such as Jiangsu, Guizhou, and Hunan in less than a year, and the amount involved in the case was more than 40 million yuan.

On July 20, it was learned from the Jingkou District Procuratorate of Zhenjiang City that after the Procuratorate filed a public prosecution, the court recently sentenced Li Mou and eight others to three years in prison for the crime of illegally absorbing public deposits, with a suspended sentence of three to five years, and a fine of 210,000 to 250,000 yuan.

Invest 1 FIL coin and get at least 2 times the return?

Mr. Jiang from Jingkou District, Zhenjiang City is a "virtual currency" enthusiast. In June 2021, he learned about an APP investment platform abbreviated as FPM through his virtual currency Q group.

The platform claims to have a good cooperative relationship with mining machine manufacturers and can help members pledge "mining". As long as you download the APP and register as a member, you can pledge "mining" with a minimum charge of 1 FIL coin, and get at least 2 times the static income. You can also get additional team income of 1% to 30% of the income by developing downlines, up to 4 times. If you apply for withdrawal, it will be credited within three days at the latest after deducting the 1% handling fee.

Mr. Jiang, who has been paying attention to and is optimistic about Filecoin, was immediately attracted. He bought 500 FIL coins from the exchange and recharged them to the FPM platform. He also recruited several of his friends in the currency circle as his downline.

As expected, as the value of FIL has been rising, the income shown on the platform has also risen accordingly. However, seeing that more and more people are recharging on the platform, and seeing news about the collapse of a virtual currency investment APP on the Internet from time to time, Mr. Jiang, who was worried that he would not get his money back, applied to the platform for a profit withdrawal.

But after waiting for five days, his application was still in the "pending review" status. Fearing that the platform would collapse, Mr. Jiang immediately reported the case to the public security agency.

After receiving the report, the public security organs found through preliminary investigation that the FPM platform was suspected of organizing and leading pyramid selling crimes, and there was an actual operator behind the platform - a certain data storage company in Guiyang. On August 31, 2021, the public security organs opened an investigation into the case.

Establishing a company to cover up illegal facts

As the investigation deepened, several shareholders, led by Li, the actual controller of a data storage company in Guiyang, surfaced.

In November 2020, Li, who had been in the cryptocurrency circle for many years, was told by a friend in the cryptocurrency circle that there was a "way to make money" in the Filcoin derivative project. Through his introduction, he met Huang, a mining machine manufacturer in Beijing. Knowing that Filcoin was about to go online and was very optimistic about it, Li found several good friends such as Li and Tian to invest in "joining the group", and he was responsible for connecting with the mining machine manufacturer to purchase equipment for "mining".

After Filcoin was officially launched, Li found that the equipment he had spent a lot of money on could not mine. Upon inquiry, it was found that in addition to purchasing equipment, a large amount of FIL coins needed to be pledged in advance to "mine" and generate income. But where can you find so many FIL coins? Li, Li and others thought of the pyramid scheme of a virtual currency APP that they had recharged and used before, so they commissioned the mining machine manufacturer Huang to design and develop the "FPM" App according to a similar model, and it was officially launched in December 2020.

After the platform was launched, Li, Li and others each formed a team to collect FIL coins through online and offline promotions. In March and April 2021, Li successively brought in Xiong and Wang, who had rich "promotion and sales experience".

In May 2021, in order to attract more people and increase the credibility of the platform, Li and others also registered and established a Guiyang Data Storage Co., Ltd. During this period, they served as shareholders of the company, started to operate and promote the FPM platform in the name of the company, and signed a pledge contract with investors in the name of the company: a written commitment to return 2 times the pledged FIL coins to the participants.

From the launch of the platform on December 18, 2020 to October 13, 2021, the FPM platform had more than 10,000 registered members, with 10 levels of hierarchical relationships. It has accumulated more than 400,000 FIL coins from members, and the amount involved in the case is as high as more than 40 million.

Although the platform publicizes that all FIL invested by members is used for staking "mining", as the number of members increases, the income generated by "mining" cannot pay the agreed income. In order to avoid collapse, the platform can only continue to develop offline, increase the number of players and the number of FIL coins, and extend the originally agreed income time and withdrawal review time to maintain the continued operation of the platform.

Guide investigation, conduct detailed analysis and accurately determine the nature of the problem

In September 2021, in view of the seriousness and complexity of the case, after receiving an invitation from the public security organs, the Jingkou District Procuratorate of Zhenjiang immediately appointed Peng Li, director of the Economic Crime and Duty Crime Prosecution Department of the Procuratorate, to form a case-handling team to intervene in advance and guide investigators to investigate and collect evidence.

During this period, the case-handling team held four meetings with investigators to discuss the case and put forward more than 20 targeted suggestions on the whereabouts of funds, the authenticity of publicity language, and the establishment of nodes.

On October 24, 2022, the public security organs transferred Li Mou, Li Mou and eight others to the Jingkou District Procuratorate for review and prosecution on suspicion of organizing and leading pyramid selling activities.

After review, the case handling team believes that in order to promote the FPM platform, Li, Li and others set static and dynamic returns. Although the dynamic return rule belongs to the pattern of recruiting people in pyramid schemes, using high returns as bait to continuously develop downline personnel, it was found through appraisal and audit that Li and others used a large amount of the FIL coins they absorbed to pledge "mining" in cooperation with mining machine manufacturers, and as of the time of the incident, the FIL coins invested by Li and others were still continuing to "mine" and generate income, and there was no behavior of transferring funds. Based on this, there was no subjective intention to defraud property, and it should be determined as "illegally absorbing public deposits".

During the review and prosecution period, the procuratorate conscientiously implemented the criminal policy of combining leniency with severity, strengthened the interpretation of the law, and prompted the eight suspects to voluntarily plead guilty and accept punishment. A document in this case was rated as an excellent provincial document on interpretation of the law. At the same time, considering that Li actively cooperated with the public security organs to seize the pledged and newly produced FIL coins, and that they were sufficient to redeem the losses of investors. In October 2023, the Jingkou District Procuratorate, while prosecuting Li and eight others in accordance with the law, also recommended the application of probation.

Recently, the court adopted all the opinions and sentencing recommendations of the procuratorate and made the above-mentioned judgment.

The hospital also introduced that a certain data storage company in Guiyang was established by Li and others to illegally absorb public funds. After its establishment, its main business was to operate the FPM platform to carry out illegal fund-raising criminal activities. According to relevant laws and regulations, it was not treated as a unit crime. However, in order to further regulate the good market economic order, the Jingkou District Procuratorate promptly transferred the clues found in the case that the company was suspected of being a "shell company" to the local market supervision and management department, and urged the handling of the Guiyang data storage company in accordance with the law.

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