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Police & Fire
Romanian Duo Charged in $289K Bitcoin-For-Fake-Gold Cryptocurrency Scam In Bergen County Romanian Duo Charged in $289K Bitcoin-For-Fake-Gold Cryptocurrency Scam In Bergen County
Romanian Duo Charged in $289K Bitcoin-For-Fake-Gold Cryptocurrency Scam In Bergen County A year-long investigation has led to charges against two Romanian men accused of orchestrating a cryptocurrency scam involving fake gold and Bitcoin valued at approximately $289,000, and a Bergen County victim, authorities said. The suspects, 33-year-old Ciprian A. Tiber and 43-year-old Ahmed Zarei, remain at large and are believed to have returned to Romania following the alleged fraudulent transaction in September 2023, Bergen County Prosecutor Mark Musella announced. The investigation began when Hasbrouck Heights police contacted the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office Financial Crime…

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by Cecilia Levine
Police & Fire
‘Crypto Con Man’: Imprisoned Instagrifter Gets 7 Federal Years For $8M Fraud Scheme ‘Crypto Con Man’: Imprisoned Instagrifter Gets 7 Federal Years For $8M Fraud Scheme
‘Crypto Con Man’: Imprisoned Instagrifter Gets 7 Federal Years For $8M Fraud Scheme UPDATE: Imprisoned Instagram influencer “Jay Mazini” apparently thought that rolling on his partners in crime could mitigate the damage of a conviction for scamming investors out of at least $8 million. Three years into a mandatory four-year New Jersey state prison sentence for kidnapping an online critic, the 28-year-old Instagrifter from Bergen County agreed to rat out his friends in exchange for leniency in a federal fraud case in Brooklyn. Trouble is: He didn’t deliver much, authorities said. Mazini, whose real name is Jebara Igbara, ended up sentenced to seven years in federal prison …

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by Jerry DeMarco
Police & Fire
NJ Man Who Hired Hitman To Kill Kid Gets 6 Years, No Parole NJ Man Who Hired Hitman To Kill Kid Gets 6 Years, No Parole
NJ Man Who Hired Hitman To Kill Kid Gets 6 Years, No Parole UPDATE: A South Jersey man who paid $20,000 in bitcoin to have a 13-year-boy killed after they exchanged sexually explicit images was sentenced to six years in a federal penitentiary. John Michael Musbach, 34, of Haddonfield, must serve out just about all of the plea-bargained term because there's no parole in the federal prison system. Musbach began communicating with the child in 2015 and soon after exchanged videos and photos that were discovered by the kid's parents, federal authorities said. Musbach was living in Galloway when members of the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office raided …

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by Jerry DeMarco
Police & Fire
'PlugwalkJoe' Admits Unprecedented Twitter Hack That Included Musk, Kardashian, Biden: Feds 'PlugwalkJoe' Admits Unprecedented Twitter Hack That Included Musk, Kardashian, Biden: Feds
'PlugwalkJoe' Admits Unprecedented Twitter Hack That Included Musk, Kardashian, Biden: Feds A 23-year-old British citizen who hacked the Twitter accounts of Joe Biden, Elon Musk, Kim Kardashian and Bill Gates, among others, pleaded guilty in federal court to a host of related charges as part of a deal with the government. Joseph James O'Connor -- also known as "PlugwalkJoe" -- technically faces up to 77 years in prison under federal sentencing guidelines but will likely get somewhere between 10 to 20 years when all is said and done. The Liverpudlian hacker admitted during a plea hearing in federal court in Manhattan on Tuesday, May 9, that he committed one of the largest high-pro…

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by Jerry DeMarco
Police & Fire
NJ Man Admits Hiring Hitman To Kill Teen He Shared Sexual Photos With Online: Feds NJ Man Admits Hiring Hitman To Kill Teen He Shared Sexual Photos With Online: Feds
NJ Man Admits Hiring Hitman To Kill Teen He Shared Sexual Photos With Online: Feds A Camden County man who shared sexually explicit photos with a 14-year-old child online admitted to paying $20,000 in bitcoin to have the child killed, authorities said. John Michael Musbach, 31, of Haddonfield, pleaded guilt to an indictment charging him with knowingly and intentionally using and causing another to use a facility of interstate and foreign commerce, that is the internet, with the intent that a murder be committed, U.S. Attorney Philip R. Sellinger said. In the summer of 2015, Musbach reportedly exchanged sexually explicit photographs and videos with the victim, a …

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by Jon Craig
News
13 Chinese Nationals Charged With Multiple Acts Of Espionage By Feds In Washington, NJ, NY 13 Chinese Nationals Charged With Multiple Acts Of Espionage By Feds In Washington, NJ, NY
13 Chinese Nationals Charged With Multiple Acts Of Espionage By Feds In Washington, NJ, NY Thirteen people, including members of China’s security and intelligence services, have been charged with trying to recruit professors and others in the United States to act as agents for their country, federal authorities in New York, New Jersey and Washington, DC announced. Tales of international intrigue include allegations that the defendants plotted to steal documents from a federal prosecutor's office to subvert a criminal investigation into a major Chinese company. Some of them are also charged in a spy-versus-spy encounter involving a $41,000 bribe in Bitcoin paid to an American…

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by Jerry DeMarco
News
Worldwide Ransomware Rampage: Iranians Hack NJ Town, PA Domestic Violence Shelter, Feds Charge Worldwide Ransomware Rampage: Iranians Hack NJ Town, PA Domestic Violence Shelter, Feds Charge
Worldwide Ransomware Rampage: Iranians Hack NJ Town, PA Domestic Violence Shelter, Feds Charge Federal authorities are offering a $10 million reward to help locate a trio of Iranian nationals who held the computer systems of a New Jersey town, a domestic violence shelter in Pennsylvania and hundreds of other victims across the U.S. and abroad hostage in a series of hack attacks. Using Microsoft’s BitLocker security tool, the hackers locked up and then stole secure files before sending ransom notes – some of which were spit out on the victims’ printers, the FBI said on Wednesday, Sept. 14. The unidentified shelter ended up paying $13,000 in bitcoin to retrieve its files, according to …

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by Jerry DeMarco
News
Self-Proclaimed Bitcoin Tycoon Says Edgewater Restaurant Gunman Robbed Him Of $350,000 Watch Self-Proclaimed Bitcoin Tycoon Says Edgewater Restaurant Gunman Robbed Him Of $350,000 Watch
Self-Proclaimed Bitcoin Tycoon Says Edgewater Restaurant Gunman Robbed Him Of $350,000 Watch A man who claims to have made a fortune in bitcoin said he and his girlfriend were robbed at a Hudson River restaurant by a gunman who took their watches – one of them worth $350,000 and the other $47,000. The robber approached him and the 36-year-old woman from Long Island as they sat outside Fleming’s Steakhouse just south of the George Washington Bridge in Edgewater late last Friday, June 17, said Jeff Duprex, 52. “We were sitting at the first table on the patio to the right. I was sitting with my back to the entrance of the patio,” Duprex told Daily Voice. “This [black] kid in his 20’s,…

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by Jerry DeMarco
News
Feds: Fort Lee Woman Gets 27 Months For Stealing $300,000 From ID Theft Victims Feds: Fort Lee Woman Gets 27 Months For Stealing $300,000 From ID Theft Victims
Feds: Fort Lee Woman Gets 27 Months For Stealing $300,000 From ID Theft Victims A confessed cybercriminal from Fort Lee was sentenced Monday to 27 months in federal prison for snatching nearly $300,000 from the accounts of ID theft victims, authorities said. Briana Burford was caught using Bitcoin to make the purchases through “carding” sites that traffic in stolen credit card and bank account information, Acting U.S. Attorney Rachael A. Honig said. Rather than risk trial, she took a deal from the government, pleading guilty in U.S. District Court in Newark in November 2019 to wire fraud. Federal authorities didn’t say whether the deal reached with Burford nearly two …

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by Jerry DeMarco
News
Wife Of Instagram Celeb Jailed In Plot To Kidnap, Terrorize NJ Man Who Trashed Him Online Wife Of Instagram Celeb Jailed In Plot To Kidnap, Terrorize NJ Man Who Trashed Him Online
Wife Of Instagram Celeb Jailed In Plot To Kidnap, Terrorize NJ Man Who Trashed Him Online The wife of Bergen County-based Instagram influencer "Jay Mazini” was in on a plot to kidnap, threaten and terrorize a Fort Lee man who’d posted negative comments about him on social media, authorities said Friday. Joumana Danoun, 21, of Paterson also then tried to get the victim to drop the charges, they said. Danoun joined her husband in the Bergen County Jail following her arrest Thursday. "Mazini" of Edgewater, whose real name is Jebara J. Igbara, 26, has been held in the county lockup since authorities arrested him on kidnapping charges in March. An FBI detainer prevents a local judg…

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by Jerry DeMarco
News
Trio Charged With Helping Bergen Instagram Celeb Kidnap, Terrorize Man Who Trashed Him Online Trio Charged With Helping Bergen Instagram Celeb Kidnap, Terrorize Man Who Trashed Him Online
Trio Charged With Helping Bergen Instagram Celeb Kidnap, Terrorize Man Who Trashed Him Online Authorities on Friday captured a third accused accomplice of an Instagram influencer who they said kidnapped a man in Bergen County, stripped him naked and held a machete to his neck while threatening to kill him if he didn’t remove negative social media posts. Alaziz Dalmida, 21, was the last piece of a puzzle involving “Jay Mazini” – real name Jebara J. Igbara – authorities said. Igbara, 25, of Edgewater had claimed a net worth of $33 million while cultivating a reputation for distributing stacks of cash to random people in New York. That was before federal authorities in Brooklyn charge…

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by Jerry DeMarco
News
NJ Sex Offender Indicted For Trying To Hire Dark Web Hit Man To Kill NY Teen NJ Sex Offender Indicted For Trying To Hire Dark Web Hit Man To Kill NY Teen
NJ Sex Offender Indicted For Trying To Hire Dark Web Hit Man To Kill NY Teen A New Jersey man who admitted trading sexually explicit images with a minor took a different tack before pleading guilty: Looking to have the kid killed, he paid $20,000 in bitcoin to a bogus murder-for-hire site on the dark web, a federal indictment alleges. John Michael Musbach, 31, was a free man, having been sentenced in February 2018 to a two-year suspended sentence with lifetime parole supervision for his exchanges with the then-13-year-old from upstate New York. A year or so had passed when cybercrime sleuth Chris Monteiro tipped federal agents off to messages that Musbach exchanged …

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by Jerry DeMarco
News
Instagram Celeb Held In Bergen Jail For Kidnapping, Terrorizing Man Who Trashed Him Online Instagram Celeb Held In Bergen Jail For Kidnapping, Terrorizing Man Who Trashed Him Online
Instagram Celeb Held In Bergen Jail For Kidnapping, Terrorizing Man Who Trashed Him Online An Instagram influencer and two associates kidnapped a man in Bergen County, then stripped him naked and held a machete to his neck while threatening to kill him if he didn’t remove negative social media posts, authorities charged. Jebara J. Igbara, 25, told the victim that a video of the kidnapping would be released to social media if he didn’t do what he was told, they said. Earlier this week, federal authorities in Brooklyn charged Ibarra with scamming four of his nearly 1 million followers out of Bitcoin virtual currency by sending them worthless wire transfers in exchange for more than…

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by Jerry DeMarco
News
NJ Man Who Vowed To Shoot Pro-Israel Demonstrators, Bomb Trump Tower Admits Supporting Hamas NJ Man Who Vowed To Shoot Pro-Israel Demonstrators, Bomb Trump Tower Admits Supporting Hamas
NJ Man Who Vowed To Shoot Pro-Israel Demonstrators, Bomb Trump Tower Admits Supporting Hamas A Somerset County man who told Instagram followers he was wanted to shoot or run down pro-Israel demonstrators and bomb Trump Tower admitted Tuesday that he secretly supported Hamas. Jonathan Xie, 21, of Basking Ridge admitted during a video conference with a federal judge in Trenton that he wired $100 via Moneygram to a purported member of the Al-Qassam Brigades, a faction of Hamas that has conducted suicide bombings and other attacks on civilians inside Israel, U.S. Attorney Craig Carpenito said. “Just donated $100 to Hamas,” Xie posted to his Instagram account. “Pretty sure it was illega…

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by Jerry DeMarco
Schools
Livingston Public Schools Hit With Ransomware Attack Livingston Public Schools Hit With Ransomware Attack
Livingston Public Schools Hit With Ransomware Attack The Livingston Public School district announced a late start to classes Monday due to a ransomware attack which has left the district's computers unusable.  The district's servers went down Friday and an assessment by an outside security company determined the cause to be a ransomware attack. The party responsible is not believed to be associated with the Livingston community or its public schools.  Livingston officials said data, such as transcripts, is not typically stolen or altered in such attacks. Instead, the computers are rendered inoperable. The party responsible for the a…

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by Paul Milo
Police & Fire
Feds Smash World's Largest Dark Web Child Porn Network By Following Bitcoin Trail Feds Smash World's Largest Dark Web Child Porn Network By Following Bitcoin Trail
Feds Smash World's Largest Dark Web Child Porn Network By Following Bitcoin Trail Federal authorities have smashed the world’s largest dark web child porn marketplace, arresting a whopping 337 people around the world – some of them in New Jersey, New York and Connecticut -- all thanks to bitcoin. To sniff out the network, investigators used a unique strategy. "Welcome to Video" was one of the first websites of its kind to monetize exploitation videos of infants, toddlers and other children, "one of the worst forms of evil imaginable," one federal prosecutor said. The network used bitcoin because of the difficulty in tracing it, the Justice Department said in a complaint…

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by Jerry DeMarco
Police & Fire
NEWEST PHONE SCAM: IRS Imposters Convice Victims To Buy Bitcoins NEWEST PHONE SCAM: IRS Imposters Convice Victims To Buy Bitcoins
Newest Phone Scam: IRS Imposters Convice Victims To Buy Bitcoins As tax season heats up, phone scammers posing as members of the IRS are fooling people into buying – and then giving them – bitcoins. Don’t fall for it, police urge. Soon after bodegas in New York City began installing bitcoin ATMs, thieves launched the phone scam. The scammers call unwitting victims, tell them that “fraudulent activities” have been detected and that the IRS will cancel their Social Security numbers if they don’t transfer the money using a bitcoin machine, Wayne Police Detective Capt. Laurence W. Martin said Friday. They also tell the victim to text photos of both the fron…

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by Jerry DeMarco
Police & Fire
Bitcoin Bomb Threat: Obsolete Compound 'Hidden Anywhere' Would 'Wound People If It Detonates' Bitcoin Bomb Threat: Obsolete Compound 'Hidden Anywhere' Would 'Wound People If It Detonates'
Bitcoin Bomb Threat: Obsolete Compound 'Hidden Anywhere' Would 'Wound People If It Detonates' UPDATE: Whoever emailed tens of thousands of threats to schools, hospitals, universities, media organizations, businesses and public agencies nationwide on Thursday vowed to use an outdated explosive compound that is "impossible to damage the building structure" but would leave "wounded people if it detonates," Daily Voice has learned. Buildings were evacuated and searches were conducted at hundreds of locations from coast to coast before local and federal authorities deemed the threats bogus. Although they weren't all identical, many of the emails appeared to come from Moscow and bore simi…

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by Jerry DeMarco
Police & Fire
Bomb Threats Reported At 2 Fair Lawn Schools, Maywood Store Bomb Threats Reported At 2 Fair Lawn Schools, Maywood Store
Bomb Threats Reported At 2 Fair Lawn Schools, Maywood Store A string of bomb threats across the country were being investigated Thursday by law enforcement agencies. Among them were threats to two Fair Lawn schools and a Maywood furniture store, local police said. Threats to both Memorial Middle School and Radburn Elementary School were dismissed early and Maywood Furniture were deemed not credible, authorities said. “The mass robo-email threats were sent all across the country this afternoon to schools, businesses, and government offices,” Fair Lawn Police Chief Glenn Cauwels said. “The threats stem from an unknown writer’s demand for bitcoin in …

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by Cecilia Levine
Police & Fire
'Digital Blackmail': FBI Hunts Iranian Duo Named In $30M International 'Ransomware' Plot 'Digital Blackmail': FBI Hunts Iranian Duo Named In $30M International 'Ransomware' Plot
'Digital Blackmail': FBI Hunts Iranian Duo Named In $30M International 'Ransomware' Plot Two Iranian men were being sought by the FBI for what one official called “21st-century digital blackmail” that netted them more than $6 million while racking up over $30 million in losses to hospitals, municipalities and public agencies across North America. Faramarz Shahi Savandi, 34, and Mohammad Mehdi Shah Mansouri, 27, operated an international computer hacking and extortion racket for more than 2½ years, a grand jury indictment unsealed Wednesday morning in U.S. District Court in Newark charges. Working from inside Iran, Savandi and Mansouri authored “SamSam Ransomware” that was “capa…

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by Jerry DeMarco