A Rochester man has pleaded guilty to charges of operating an illegal money transmitting business involving the digital currency known as “Bitcoins.”
Federal prosecutors say 32-year-old Richard Petix lied to federal probation officers and federal agents about what he was up to with a laptop and a smartphone. Petix was on supervised release after being convicted in 2009 of sending child porn across state lines via the internet. A condition of his parole required him to report any computers he used.
Petix told the authorities he wasn’t using a computer, but investigators say he was secretly helping people transfer more than $200,000 in Bitcoins to customers across the United States. At least some of his clients were using that digital money to buy drugs from dealers on the dark web. Homeland Security and U.S. Postal Service agents found out what he was up to and arrested him.