Officials with the United States Department of Justice announced charges against early Bitcoin (BTC) investor Roger Ver, known by many as ‘Bitcoin Jesus.’ 

In an April 30 notice, the Justice Department said authorities in Spain had arrested Ver based on criminal charges in the United States, including mail fraud, tax evasion and filing false tax returns. The U.S. government alleged Ver defrauded the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) out of roughly $48 million with his failure to report capital gains on his sale of Bitcoin and other assets.

According to the indictment filed on Feb. 15 but unsealed on April 29, Ver allegedly took control of roughly 70,000 BTC in June 2017 — before the now famous bull run — and sold many of them for $240 million. U.S. officials said they planned to extradite Ver from Spain to the United States to stand trial.

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Reactions to Ver’s arrest on social media were mixed. However, Bitcoiner Dan Held, the former growth lead at Kraken, claimed Ver “deserves everything that he’s about to get” after he “nearly destroyed Bitcoin.”

“Roger attacked my livelihood by trying to get me fired, called up others to hurt my relationships, and attacked my reputation,” said Held on X. “He misaligned expectations around Bitcoin so much that it led to a civil war.”

Ver was also a proponent of Bitcoin Cash (BCH). In 2022, he became embroiled in a scandal with crypto investment platform CoinFlex, which claimed he owed them $47 million in USD Coin (USDC). He had not commented on social media regarding the Justice Department charges at the time of publication.

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