Ilya Lichtenstein, Bitcoin hacker behind massive crypto theft, credits Trump for early prison release
Ilya Lichtenstein had been sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty and admitting to the hack of crypto assets valued in the billions of dollars.
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The Russian-U.S. national who hacked crypto exchange Bitfinex and stole nearly 120,000 bitcoin said he has been freed from prison early thanks to the bipartisan prison-reform law signed by President Donald Trump.
Ilya Lichtenstein, 38, had been sentenced in November 2024 to five years in prison after pleading guilty to a money laundering conspiracy charge and admitting to the hack of crypto assets now valued in the billions of dollars.
But late Thursday night, a post on Lichtenstein's official X account declared, "Thanks to President Trump's First Step Act, I have been released from prison early."
Courtroom sketch of Ilya "Dutch" Lichtenstein while pleading guilty to laundering the stolen bitcoin in federal court in Washington.
Artist: William Hennessey
"I remain committed to making a positive impact in cybersecurity as soon as I can," Lichtenstein's post said.
"To the supporters, thank you for everything. To the haters, I look forward to proving you wrong."
A Trump administration official told CNBC on Friday morning that Lichtenstein "has served significant time on his sentence and is currently on home confinement consistent with statute and Bureau of Prisons policies."
Attorneys for Lichtenstein did not immediately respond to requests for comment on his release.
Lichtenstein's wife, Heather Morgan — who also pleaded guilty to helping launder the stolen funds — shared Lichtenstein's message on her own X account, saying, "The best New Years present I could get was finally having my husband home after 4 years of being apart."
Morgan's tweet, posted two minutes after Lichtenstein's, included a photo of the couple smiling for a selfie.
Lichtenstein's sentence included credit for time he already served in custody following his arrest in 2022, more than five years after Bitfinex was hacked.
As of Friday morning, a search for Lichtenstein's name using the federal government's inmate locator website returned one result showing Lichtenstein is scheduled to be released on Feb. 9.
The Bureau of Prisons did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Booking photos for Heather Morgan and Ilya Lichtenstein.
Courtesy: Alexandria Adult Detention Center.
Morgan, 35, a rapper who releases music under the name "Razzlekhan" and also went by "The Crocodile of Wall Street," was sentenced to 18 months' incarceration shortly after Lichtenstein received his prison sentence.
She entered prison in February. But on Oct. 26, Morgan posted a video of herself saying she had been released early.
She also thanked Trump.
"Why hello Razzlers, I have missed you," Morgan said in the clip, in which she appears in a bathtub wearing only a hair towel.
"It is very good to be back, and I want to give a shout out to Papa Trump for making my 18-month sentence shorter," she said. An email to Morgan's manager was not immediately returned.
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Trump signed the First Step Act in December 2018, during his first presidential term. The legislation aimed to reduce the size of the federal prison population through a series of reforms, including by establishing a "a risk and needs assessment system" that gives some inmates the chance of early release into home confinement.
It is unclear whether Trump or the White House had any direct involvement in Lichtenstein or Morgan securing an early prison release. But the announcements from the bitcoin hacker and his wife follow a number of high-profile cybercrime-related pardons and commutations that have been doled out by the crypto friendly president since his return to office.
One day after his inauguration, Trump pardoned Ross Ulbricht, founder of the infamous dark web marketplace Silk Road.
In October, Trump pardoned Changpeng Zhao, the founder of major crypto exchange Binance, who had pleaded guilty in 2023 to enabling money laundering on the platform.
