The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has levied a penalty of $60 million on Helix and Coin Ninja founder and primary operator Larry Dean Harmon for violating the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA).
Both Helix and Coin Ninja are convertible virtual currency related businesses that Harmon operated as unregistered money service providers. Under BSA, exchangers and administrators of convertible virtual currency are required to register with FinCEN, comply with AML regulations and follow all reporting obligations. FinCEN requires financial institutions that are mixers and tumblers of convertible virtual currency to also meet these same requirements. Harmon violated all these requirements.
Through his companies, Harmon became a convertible virtual currency exchanger, conducting transactions in bitcoins. Harmon operated both Helix and Coin Ninja as bitcoin mixers. By advertising their services on the dark web, he allowed customers to anonymously purchase narcotics, guns, child pornography etc. Harmon knowingly failed to conduct customer due diligence for over 1.2 million transactions in 2014-17. He even conducted transactions with drug traffickers, fraudsters and other criminals. Such wrongdoings have led to his prosecution in the US and now FinCEN’s civil monetary penalty.
Source name: FinCEN