Five people arrested for crypto murder in Spain
Spanish police said Wednesday they have arrested five people for abducting and murdering a man to steal his crypto money while another four were charged in Denmark.
The man and his partner were attacked in April in southern Spain. The man was shot in the leg when he attempted to escape, police said in a statement.
The pair were then "taken to a house where they were held for several hours while the perpetrators tried to access their wallets in order to steal crypto assets".
The woman was freed at midnight and reported the abduction. Police later found her partner's body in a wooded area at Mijas in Malaga province.
Following house searches in Madrid and Malaga, police seized pistols and "numerous items related to the crime", including a pair of trousers marked with blood.
Spanish police did not specify when the arrests took place.
Of the four people charged in Denmark, two were already serving prison sentences for similar offences.
Kidnappings and attempted abductions in the crypto world have multiplied globally in line with the currency's rise.
In January, kidnappers seized French crypto boss David Balland and his partner. Balland co-founded the crypto firm Ledger, valued at more than $1 billion at the time.
Balland's finger was cut off by his kidnappers, who had demanded a ransom. He was freed the next day, and his girlfriend was found tied up in the boot of a car outside Paris.
In May, attackers in Paris tried unsuccessfully to kidnap the daughter and grandson of cryptocurrency exchange platform Paymium's chief executive.
