Hydra Darknet Founder sentenced to life imprisonment for running $5 billion crypto black market  

The development was reported by various sources and was amplified on X by the popular crypto show Maria Nawfal’s roundtable.

“ DARKNET BOSS GETS LIFE SENTENCE Stanislav Moiseev — the man behind Hydra — aka the darknet’s “Amazon” — just got slammed with a life sentence in Russia. His squad of 15 will join him in jail for the slinging of illicit goods on the platform and laundering billions of dollars.  

Hydra was the kingpin of darknet crypto, owning 80% of the market in 2021, until German authorities shut it down in 2022. Servers seized, Bitcoin bagged, and dreams crushed. Moral of the story? Don’t let your decentralized dream outgrow common sense”. Maria Nawfal tweeted.

Stanislav Moiseev facilitated over $5 billion in transactions through his crypto-mixing platform Hydra which became the largest darknet marketplace in the world.

The Moscow Regional Court handed Moiseev and 15 other accomplices their sentences for organizing a criminal enterprise and engaging in the illegal production and distribution of psychotropic substances.

Stanislav Moiseev’s accomplices were handed lesser sentences by the Russian court ranging from 8 to 23 years. Moiseev was fined $32,000 while his accomplices got $152,400 in penalties.

Properties and cars belonging to Moiseev and his accomplices were confiscated after the trial.

The US Justice Department revealed that Hydra processed approximately $5.2 billion in transactions from 2015 to 2022. The platform accounted for over 80% of darknet crypto-related transactions in 2021.

At the time of its bust, Hydra had 17 million customers and 19,000 vendor accounts. German authorities also seized a tonne of narcotics and Psychotropic substances during the raid.

Moiseev’s accomplices include Alexander Chirkov, Andrei Trunov, Evgeny Andreev, and others. Their sentences remain subject to appeal