Inside the Prince Group case: forced labor, pig butchering, and a record $15 billion bitcoin seizure
US prosecutors say Chen Zhi ran Cambodian forced-labor compounds where trafficked workers were made to run romance-investment cons. Here is how the scheme works — and how to spot it.
On October 14, 2025, the U.S. Department of Justice unsealed an indictment in the Eastern District of New York charging Chen Zhi — the 37-year-old founder and chairman of Cambodia-based Prince Holding Group, who also used the name "Vincent" — with wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy. If convicted, he faces up to 40 years in prison. Prince Group has denied the allegations.
The same filing carried a number without precedent. Alongside the indictment, the DOJ lodged a civil forfeiture complaint for roughly 127,271 bitcoin — worth more than $15 billion at the time — which prosecutors describe as the largest forfeiture action in the department's history.
But the money is the aftershock. The case the DOJ lays out is, first, about people held against their will.
The scam-compound economy
According to the DOJ, Chen Zhi directed a network of forced-labor "scam compounds" across Cambodia. Trafficked workers, held under threats and violence, were made to run the frauds — not the architects of the scheme, but its coerced instruments.
The product they were forced to sell is what investigators call "pig butchering": a slow con that blends a fake romance or friendship with a fake investment. TRM Labs reports the group was earning more than $30 million a day from fraud by 2018.
Proceeds moved through "money houses" that collected victim payments in bitcoin and stablecoins — USDT and USDC — then converted them into clean crypto, per Chainalysis and Elliptic. The operation also mined its own bitcoin, including a Laos venture run through Warp Data Technology that funneled coins into wallets prosecutors tie to Chen Zhi.
Blockchain analysts note that much of the seized bitcoin traces back to a December 2020 movement known as the "LuBian hack." The DOJ treats the coins as Chen Zhi-controlled proceeds regardless.
What it costs the victim
The scale of $15 billion hides the individual wound. The FBI documented a single case in which 259 Americans lost $18 million to the Jin Bei compounds — and officials describe even that as a fraction of the total.
The playbook is consistent, which is what makes it teachable. A stranger reaches you on a dating app, through a "wrong number" text, or on a professional network. The relationship warms over days or weeks. Eventually, gently, an investment opportunity appears — usually crypto, on a platform that looks legitimate and may even let you "withdraw" a small early gain to build trust. Then the deposits grow, and the withdrawals stop.
- An online-only contact you have never met in person steers the conversation toward crypto or trading.
- You are directed to a specific app, website, or "account manager" instead of a mainstream, regulated exchange.
- A small early withdrawal succeeds, encouraging a far larger deposit.
- You are told you must pay "taxes," "fees," or "unlock" charges before you can cash out.
- There is manufactured urgency — a closing window, a limited allocation, a can't-miss moment.
- The person avoids a live video call or an in-person meeting.
Where the case stands
On the same October day, the Treasury's OFAC — coordinating with the UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office — designated Prince Group a transnational criminal organization and sanctioned 146 associated targets.
Chen Zhi was not in custody when the indictment was unsealed. In January 2026 he was reported detained in Cambodia and sent to China, described in reporting as an extradition; he has never been in U.S. custody. The seized bitcoin remains with the U.S. government, though its market value has since fallen with the price of bitcoin.
For readers, the lesson is smaller and more useful than $15 billion. The compounds industrialize a single human vulnerability — the willingness to trust someone who seems to care. Slowing down, and refusing to move money to a person you have never met, is the defense.
— Sources: [DOJ](https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/chairman-prince-group-indicted-operating-cambodian-forced-labor-scam-compounds-engaged) · [Chainalysis](https://www.chainalysis.com/blog/southeast-asia-crypto-scam-network-mining-pig-butchering-october-2025/) · [Elliptic](https://www.elliptic.co/blog/prince-group-targeted-with-crypto-sanctions-for-global-pig-butchering-operations) · [TRM Labs](https://www.trmlabs.com/resources/blog/operation-prince-inside-the-global-effort-that-led-to-the-largest-forfeiture-in-us-history)
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