Police seized 61,000 Bitcoin from Zhimin Qian, 47, as part of a years-long money laundering investigation.
Published On 12 Nov 2025
The United Kingdom has sentenced a Chinese woman to 11 years and eight months in prison for a years-long scheme to launder investment scam proceeds into Bitcoin, luxury property, and other assets now worth about 4.8 billion British pounds ($6.3bn).
Zhimin Qian, 47, was sentenced by the Southwark Crown Court in London on Tuesday, in a case that saw UK police seize a record-breaking 61,000 Bitcoin as part of their investigation.
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Qian, who is also known by the alias Yadi Zhang, was found guilty of money laundering and possessing illegally obtained cryptocurrency.
Will Lyne, the Metropolitan Police’s head of Economic and Cybercrime Command, described the case as “one of the largest and most complex economic crime investigations ever undertaken by the Met”.
“This is currently the largest cryptocurrency seizure by law enforcement in the UK and is the largest money laundering case in UK history by value,” he said in a statement.
UK authorities allege that Qian helped mastermind an investment scam in China between 2014 and 2017 that defrauded 128,000 people out of roughly £4.6bn, according to sentencing remarks from Judge Sally-Ann Hales.
Much of the funds were later recovered by police in China, but Hales said that a “sizeable amount was siphoned off and used by” Qian, and transferred into 70,000 Bitcoin stored on a laptop wallet