On Monday, a 24-year-old man pleaded guilty to his role in a bitcoin ATM and in-person heist that bilked a Las Vegas casino employee out of more than $1.1 million.
The theft took place on June 17 at the Circa Las Vegas Casino, when a cage supervisor got a call from someone pretending to be the casino’s owner, as reported by 3News. Cage supervisors, normally located behind bars, handle all money transactions between the casino and its clients.
The caller said that a “emergency payment to the fire department for fire safety devices” was required and that the casino would have to close if the supervisor didn’t come through with the money.
The supervisor was then instructed to transfer $320,000 into a Bitcoin ATM next to a gas station, which they mistook for a text from their management. She consented, and when her deposit reached the maximum allowed, she met a guy pretending to be an attorney for Circa at a different gas station.
After that, she had to hand up $350,000 to a different lawyer, who turned out to be Erik Gutierrez Martinez (the guy who turned in his plea agreement earlier this week) at a restaurant.
On June 17, the casino notified the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department that it suspected a theft or fraud at the cashier cage. After locating Martinez with the stolen $850,000, police followed him to his aunt’s residence and detained him there.
While more than $1.1 million was taken from Circa, Martinez admitted to stealing more than $100,000. A statement made by Martinez’s attorney in his defense reads, “It is evident from the surrounding circumstances that Erik is not the mastermind behind this occurrence. “
Casino.org reports that detectives are looking into whether Martinez was involved in a March robbery of $250,000 and another Bitcoin kiosk.
On October 30, Martinez will be condemned to a jail term of one to ten years. So yet, no one else involved in the robbery has been captured.
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