CRYPTO CRIMES

Upper East Side Woman Accused of Funneling Crypto to Terrorist Groups

Victoria Jacobs, who was previously arrested for living in a Hamptons home she didn’t own, was indicted this week.

A New York woman has been indicted for using cryptocurrency to provide money to Syrian terrorist groups, the Manhattan District Attorney said Wednesday. Victoria Jacobs, a 43-year-old Upper East Side resident, had been under investigation for a year-and-a-half for allegedly donating more than $5,000 to the group Malhama Tactical and laundering more than $10,000 to them via crypto and Google Play gift cards. In 2019, she allegedly provided a U.S. army handbook to an online group she thought was linked to an al-Qaeda affiliate. In 2021, she bought military-style combat knives, metal knuckles and throwing-stars, also posting on online forums that she was a “brother” behind “enemy lines” needing “courage” to carry out missions, prosecutors say. Jacobs, who also used the alias Bakhrom Talipov, was arrested in 2020 for renting out a house in the Hamptons without the owner’s permission. A citizen of Uzbetiskan and a native of the former Soviet Union, she had also been denied asylum in the U.S. in 2014. She’s been charged with soliciting or providing support for an act of terrorism in the first degree and money laundering, among other charges.