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Former Secret Service Agent Bridges Suspected In Additional Bitcoin Thefts

Last Updated March 4, 2021 4:49 PM
Lester Coleman
Last Updated March 4, 2021 4:49 PM

Shaun Bridges, the former Secret Service agent who pleaded guilty to stealing more than $800,000 in bitcoin while investigating Silk Road, is suspected in two other theft cases, according to a recently unsealed affidavit, Reuters  reported. Bridges is believed to have stolen $700,000 of bitcoin from a Secret Service account three months after the agency was urged to remove his access to the account.

Shaun Bridges
Shaun Bridges

The Secret Service did not move the funds, and later learned the funds were stolen. The theft was discovered after a court ordered the agency to pay claimants for their losses.

The former Secret Service agent pleaded guilty last year and was sentenced to nearly six years in prison for stealing more than $800,000 in bitcoin during the Silk Road investigation.

Secret Service Failed To Act

The Justice Department learned in April 2015 that Bridges might have had a cryptographic key giving him access to a bitcoin wallet with $700,000 that the Silk Road task force seized in 2014, according to an affidavit unsealed Thursday. The department urged the agency to move the funds out of the wallet.

The Secret Service discovered the funds were stolen after a court ordered it to pay a portion to claimants, prosecutors noted in an accompanying motion. The bitcoin was moved in July 2015 but only discovered missing in December, the affidavit said.

The Secret Service and Bridges’ attorney, Steven Levin, chose not to comment.

Bridges admitted stealing money from Silk Road accounts and framed someone else for it, which led Silk Road chief Ross Ulbricht to plan a murder. Ulbricht is serving a life sentence.

Also read: Judge sentences Silk Road administrator; corrupt agent gets rearrested

Police Rearrest Bridges In February

Police rearrested Bridges at his home this February after finding him with a bag containing corporate records for three offshore accounts, a bulletproof vest and a passport, CCN.com reported. This arrest occurred shortly before he was scheduled to turn himself in to start to serve a 71-month sentence in a New Hampshire minimum-security prison.

Bridges and former Drug Enforcement Administration Agent Carl Force each received more than 70 months for stealing hundreds of thousands in digital currency while working on the Silk Road case undercover.