As a seasoned crypto investor with over a decade of experience, this recent sentence of Dylan Meissner, the former finance vice president at Delphi Digital, has left me with a mixture of disappointment and caution. I have seen many instances where people exploit their positions for personal gain, but this case is particularly disheartening because it involves a company that is deeply rooted in the crypto industry, an area I hold close to my heart.
Previously serving as the Vice President of Finance at Delphi Digital, an individual was given a prison sentence of four years following his admission to stealing approximately $4.5 million from the cryptocurrency research company.
On December 17th, Connecticut District Court Judge Michael P. Shea handed down a sentence of 48 months in prison for Dylan Meissner, followed by two years of supervised release. Additionally, Meissner was ordered to repay over $4.6 million he had stolen and an outstanding loan. According to the Justice Department, this is the ruling.
In the court proceedings, the Justice Department did not explicitly mention Meissner’s past company by name, instead using “Company A” and “a cryptocurrency research firm.” However, it was revealed that he was employed by Delphi Digital during the commission of his offenses.
In an earlier filing this month, Meissner’s legal team frequently referred to “Delphi” as the relevant company.
During the tenure spanning from October 2021 to November 2022, serving as Delphi’s Vice President of Finance, I was entrusted with managing the company’s digital wallets containing cryptocurrencies and our traditional bank accounts.
In January of 2022, Delphi extended a loan equivalent to approximately $170,000 in Ether (50 ETH) to him, stating that the purpose was to prevent potential losses in his personal cryptocurrency investment portfolio.
Over the period between receiving the loan and his termination in November 2022, Meissner failed to repay the loan and instead, illegally pocketed approximately $4.46 million from Delphi. To conceal his theft, he falsified financial records on the company’s books.
In accordance with a settlement agreement, Meissner admitted guilt for wire fraud in July and was granted a $100,000 bond. According to the Department of Justice, he will surrender to prison on February 21, 2025. He has also relinquished his opportunity to appeal the decision.
Meissner’s proposed sentence was lower than what his attorney suggested, which was between 4 to 5 years and 3 months. However, the prosecution argued that he should receive a sentence ranging from 6.5 to 8 years, or 78 to 97 months.
Meissner’s sentencing document requested the judge to take into account his past struggles with substance abuse, his persistent attempts at staying sober, and his confession of being a drug addict who deceived the company by embezzling on a grand scale, admitting this to both himself and Delphi.
It adds he helped Delphi by making a spreadsheet of “the damage he had caused the company.”
In their statement, prosecutors argued that Meissner’s offenses were not simply a brief error in judgment, but rather a prolonged, intricate plan to embezzle millions of dollars from an employer who had given Meissner control over their financial affairs.
They claimed he informed the Probation Department that he “took the cash intending to give it back at some point,” which lawyers contested as “contradicting the idea that the defendant’s actions were driven by a gambling obsession or drug-induced confusion.
They stated that the defendant acted reasonably, albeit unethically. He aimed to utilize the company’s funds to offset his own financial losses and generate profit for himself. The plan was to repay the company once the market recovered.
CryptoMoon reached out to Meissner’s lawyers for comment.
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2024-12-19 09:11