Fuel depot CSI: Polish prosecutors hunt Zondacrypto's ghost founder while ex-cop gets charged ⛽

Polish prosecutors have charged a former police officer in connection with the collapsed Zondacrypto exchange, while investigators search a fuel depot where the platform's founder was last seen before disappearing four years ago. Artur K., a former police officer identified under Polish convention by first name and initial, was detained Tuesday in Katowice by officers from the Central Bureau for Combating Cybercrime on orders from the National Prosecutor's Office organized crime department, spokesman Waldemar Żurek said. He faces two counts: membership in an organized criminal group, and a bundled charge covering causing property damage on a great scale to BitBay, BB Trade Estonia and a third entity, aiding the misappropriation of entrusted property, aiding computer fraud, and money laundering. Żurek wrote on X: "Dziś funkcjonariusze CBZC na polecenie Śląskiego Wydziału Zamiejscowego PK zatrzymali Artura K. Zarzuty dla Artura K. to udział w grupie przestępczej, pomoc w przywłaszczeniu pieniędzy użytkowników giełdy kryptowalutowej ZondaCrypto i pranie pieniędzy pochodzących z tego…"

A search of his home turned up documentation on the exchange's operations, according to Polish Radio, citing the state news agency PAP. Prosecutor-general spokeswoman Anna Adamiak said he was being questioned as a suspect, after which prosecutors will decide whether to seek pre-trial detention. The office did not say whether he had responded to the charges. The news marks the latest arrest since at least five others were charged beginning in August, including former Polish Olympic Committee head Radosław P.; each suspect who has responded publicly has denied the charges. None of the allegations has been tested in court.

Separately, police from Katowice are searching the fuel depot where Zondacrypto founder Sylwester Suszek was last seen before vanishing in March 2022, working under a team of prosecutors alongside expert witnesses and what the office called advanced specialized forensic equipment. The case file treats Suszek's situation as unlawful deprivation of liberty rather than a disappearance, and one earlier suspect is accused of removing a hard drive from the CCTV recorder at a filling station.

Suszek founded the exchange in Katowice in 2014 as BitBay. It moved its registration to Estonia in 2020 under BB Trade Estonia, rebranded as Zondacrypto and at its peak claimed 1.3 million clients, most of them Polish. The platform froze withdrawals and went dark in April, and Estonia's financial intelligence unit revoked the operator's license on June 29.