court records, and released from custody. Zhu was acquitted in September of the Virginia charges, according to U.S. "It looks to be a good old fashioned con game where the bad guys strike up a friendship of false friendship with victims, get their confidence, get their money and steal it. "This case is about really the oldest con game in the world, just with a very new kind of technology," said Chicago federal prosecutor, Gil Soffer, ABC7's chief legal analyst. Zhu was charged singly at the time in a cryptocurrency money laundering case out of Virginia, in which authorities said Zhu's Illinois state identification card was provided to open a bank account allegedly used in the scheme. The 40-year old Chinese national had recently arrived in Illinois, according to federal investigators, on a one-way ticket from California.
Last March, federal agents did move in on the Naperville residence of Zhu. "Pig Butchering" is a cryptocurrency con that law enforcement likens to fattening up a hog before slaughter.