A man in Australia is set to appear in court next month, facing theft charges after receiving an unexpected windfall of almost 10.5 million Australian dollars (AUD) from Crypto.com.
Jatinder Singh is scheduled for a plea hearing on October 23 at the County Court of Victoria in Australia. His alleged offense? Failing to report the receipt of AUD 10.47 million from Crypto.com in 2021, it was sent to him due to an accounting error. Singh put the unexpected funds to use, purchasing four houses, cars, art, furniture, and various other items.
At present, there has yet to be a response from Singh’s lawyer to CoinDesk’s request for comment.
The accounting mishap originated when a Crypto.com employee mistakenly input Singh’s account number into a company spreadsheet meant for tracking customer refunds. It took the company seven months to discover the colossal overpayment, finally noticing it in December 2021.
Singh’s involvement with Crypto.com dates back to 2020 when he attempted to transfer funds into a Crypto.com account using his partner, Thevamanogari Manivel’s bank account. However, the company rejected the payment and tried to refund Singh approximately 64 AUD due to a discrepancy between the name on the bank account and the one on the Crypto.com account.
The realization of the error dawned on Singh the day after he received the multi-million dollar sum from Crypto.com. Once aware of the mistake, he instructed his partner to transfer a significant portion of the funds into a joint Westpac account. He also moved 4 million AUD to a bank account in Malaysia, as reported by The Guardian.
Manivel, Singh’s partner, received an 18-month sentence after pleading guilty to theft. As for Singh, whether he intends to plead guilty in the upcoming court proceedings remains uncertain.