Aurelien Michel, founder of NFT Collection Mutant Ape Planet was This week, arrested by federal authorities for allegedly orchestrating an “NFT rug pull” scam. Michel could have pulled off other scams.
According to a prominent blockchain analyst, Michel may have gotten millions of dollars in frauds similar to those committed by other people. ZachXBT The Friday alleged
ZachXBT connected Michel’s Binance address to accounts linked to two other prominent NFT rug pulls, Fashion Ape NFT and Crazy Camels.
NFT rug pulls are schemes where an NFT project’s creators sell NFTs—often thousands of them—on false promises of affiliated benefits and utility, only to abandon the project (typically deleting Discord, Twitter, and other social channels) and make away with investors’ funds.
Fashion Ape NFT’s founders collected $1.1 million from holders before abandoning the project; Crazy Camels made $1.6 million before doing the same.
On Wednesday, U.S. federal agents arrested Michel—a 24 year-old French national residing in Dubai—at JFK airport in New York City. He was charged with conspiracy to commit wirefraud for his involvement in the alleged rug-pulling of Mutant Ape Planet NFT holders.
Michel pulled the plug abruptly on the project. The collection had been worth $2.9 million. None of these perks were ever realized.
The DOJ’s complaint against Michel, unsealed in a Brooklyn federal court yesterday, made no mention of Michel’s participation in any other alleged NFT rug pull schemes besides Mutant Ape Planet.
ZachXBT used identifying information regarding Michel’s cryptocurrency accounts referenced in the DOJ’s complaint to track down the founder’s Binance account. The account was linked with several other NFT fraud projects.
The Crazy Camels are another option website, since deleted, links the profiles of one of the project’s co-founders to Michel’s Instagram account.
ZachXBT believes Michel’s alleged orchestration of multiple NFT scams using the same publicly traceable accounts indicates either a lack of fear of retribution, or a complete naivité as to the visibility of blockchain transactions.
“They [might] not have a basic understanding of how the blockchain works,” ZachXBT told Decrypt, “since they are depositing the funds to their personal CEX [centralized exchange] account, and buying expensive NFTs they flaunt on social media.”
Michel was accused by the Justice Department of openly admitting to Mutant Ape Planet discord that he had raped investors in his complaint.
“We never intended to rug but the community went way too toxic,” Michel purportedly wrote.
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