Mutant Ape Planet creator arrested in NY for alleged $2.9M NFT ‘fraud’

The developer of a Mutant Ape Yacht Membership knock-off assortment — Mutant Ape Planet — has been arrested in New York and charged with defrauding buyers of $2.9 million in a “rug pull scheme.”

The arrest came about on Jan. 4 at John F. Kennedy Worldwide Airport in New York, with homeland safety agent Ivan J. Arvelo alleging that French nationwide “Aurelien Michel perpetrated a rug pull scheme” and stole “practically $3 million from buyers for his personal private use.” He added:

“Purchasers of Mutant Ape Planet NFTs thought they were investing in a trendy new collectible, but they were deceived and received none of the promised benefits.”

Internal Revenue Service agent Thomas Fattorusso was quoted in a press release from the Department of Justice as saying that “Michel defrauded investors by making false representations of, amongst other things, giveaways, tokens with staking features, and merchandise collections.” But Michel withdrew the funds once the nonfungible tokens (NFTs) were sold out, the release says.

According to the statement, Michel admitted to the community via a social media chat that he had perpetrated a rug pull, saying “we never intended to rug but the community went way too toxic.”

The collection — a knock-off of the popular Mutant Ape Yacht Club NFT collection — consists of 6,797 NFTs stored on the Ethereum blockchain. The collection has had a total of 567 Ether (ETH) in sales however has seen its common value and gross sales quantity crater because it launched in January 2022.

Gross sales of the Mutant Ape Planet NFT assortment. Supply: Opensea

Following the arrest, holders of the gathering have been sharing their aspect of the story by way of Twitter, noting that James had tried accountable his departure on the neighborhood who have been turning into skeptical as a result of lack of exercise.

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