BC Court Sentences Hong Kong Man to 7 Years in Crypto Robbery

A British Columbia court has sentenced a 35-year-old man from Hong Kong to seven years in prison for his role in a violent home invasion that left a Port Moody family tortured and robbed of approximately US$1.6 million in cryptocurrency. The attack, which unfolded over 13 hours on April 27, 2024, involved waterboarding, beatings, and sexual assaults carried out by four intruders who targeted the family's Bitcoin holdings.

The ordeal began around 6 p.m. when two of the attackers, dressed in fake Canada Post uniforms and wearing masks, knocked on the door of the family's home claiming to deliver a package requiring a signature. The wife answered, and when the 18-year-old daughter went to fetch her father, the men forced their way inside, followed by two more accomplices. All four wore gloves and masks, communicated in English, Mandarin, and Cantonese, and referred to each other by numbers to maintain anonymity. They immediately restrained the husband, wife, and daughter with zip ties, seized their cellphones and laptops, and demanded passwords to cryptocurrency accounts under threats of death and mutilation. One intruder brandished what appeared to be a firearm.