09/10/2026
Half a million dollars a night at nightclubs. Cars worth up to $3.8 million. Watches running past $500,000 each. Rental mansions in Los Angeles, the Hamptons, and Miami, private jets, and a personal security detail. All of it paid for with money that belonged to other people.
On September 8, 2026, 22-year-old Malone Lam, a citizen of Singapore living in Miami, pleaded guilty in federal court to one count of RICO conspiracy for leading an international enterprise that stole and laundered more than $245 million in cryptocurrency. He faces up to 20 years in prison. A status hearing is set for December 8, 2026, before Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly.
According to the Justice Department, the operation ran from October 2023 through May 2025. Lam organized the enterprise, picked out the victims, and assigned roles to the people working under him. Prosecutors say members of the network operated from California, Connecticut, New York, Florida, and overseas.
The primary method was social engineering, meaning the crew talked their way into people’s accounts rather than hacking. On some occasions, the group resorted to home break-ins to reach victims’ cryptocurrency wallets directly.
He was taken into custody at a Miami rental home. Two associates have already been named in the case: Jeandiel Serrano, charged alongside Lam in 2024, and Evan Tangeman, 22, who was sentenced in April 2026 to more than five years for money laundering.
The Offices of the United States Attorneys issued a warning “If you build a cybercrime empire, we will find you, dismantle your operation, and hold you accountable.”