A Nashville man was arrested on Friday for allegedly stealing $400,000 in money and a Ledger pockets containing over 5 million XRP tokens from the widow of nation music star George Jones.
The accused man, Kirk West, reportedly dated George Jones’ widow Nancy for years, and satisfied her in 2016 to purchase up a number of cryptocurrencies, together with XRP.
Since 2016, XRP’s value has exploded, just lately hitting a brand new all-time excessive mark of $3.65.
A Tennessee man is dealing with years behind bars for allegedly stealing tens of millions of {dollars} price of XRP from the widow of a famed nation music star.
Kirk West, a Nashville space resident, was arrested on Friday for the alleged theft of roughly $400,000 in money and a Ledger pockets containing over 5.5 million XRP tokens. The alleged sufferer of the caper? West’s spurned lover, Nancy Jones—the fourth and last spouse of George Jones, the late nation music sensation.
So how, precisely, did XRP—the red-hot cryptocurrency created by Ripple’s founders—find yourself entrance and middle in an alleged decades-spanning southern saga of romance, music, deception, and crime?
In keeping with courtroom filings first reported on by native information station WKRN, Nancy Jones first encountered West, the purported XRP swindler, in the months after her husband, famed nation star George Jones, handed away in 2013. West claimed to have an interest in shopping for Jones’ residence, and shortly after started providing the widow comfort and companionship.
Kirk West was arrested Friday on felony theft prices. Courtesy: Franklin Police Division
Per a restraining order Jones would later file in opposition to West, the 2 turned romantically concerned weeks after Jones allowed West to change into her roommate. Jones claimed she wholly funded West’s way of life from then on, taking him on holidays and shopping for him luxurious automobiles.
Jones would later assert that West was not rich or profitable, as he had initially claimed to be, however was as a substitute “penniless.”
In 2016, West pled responsible to 2 counts of felony financial institution fraud, and was positioned beneath home arrest at Jones’ residence. It was throughout this era that, per Jones, West turned a self-proclaimed “crypto professional,” and persuaded the widow to purchase up massive positions in a number of cryptocurrencies together with XRP, Ethereum (ETH), Dogecoin (DOGE), Shiba Inu (SHIB), and Stellar (XLM), one other token created by one of Ripple’s founders.
Simply weeks in the past, West allegedly broke into two safes in Jones’ residence and stole, amongst different objects, a Ledger pockets containing 5,534,307 XRP tokens. Two days later, Jones booted West out of her home. On Friday, native police arrested West on a felony theft cost on the Nashville Worldwide Airport, the Franklin Police Division confirmed with Decrypt.
Jones and her attorneys have been reportedly in a position to get better most of the allegedly stolen XRP, however haven’t been in a position to observe down roughly 483,000 of the tokens.
The timing of the saga is apt, in some methods: XRP has flown to all-time highs in current weeks, after years of flagging fortunes. Again in 2016, when West and Jones first invested in the cryptocurrency, it was price roughly half a cent. Earlier this month, the token exploded to $3.65, a brand new document.
The sum of XRP tokens allegedly held in Nancy Jones’ protected and later stolen by West would have been price about $35,000 in 2016. At writing, it’s now price greater than $17.4 million.
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