PARIS — In a recent nighttime operation, French police successfully freed the father of a prominent cryptocurrency magnate who had been kidnapped and held for ransom. This marks the latest incident in France targeting individuals associated with digital currency management.
The man was kidnapped Thursday morning in Paris, the prosecutor’s office said Sunday.
“The man abducted was the father of a person who amassed wealth through cryptocurrencies, with the event tied to a ransom demand,” the statement revealed, while withholding their identities and additional details.
According to the prosecutor’s office, the authorities traced the hostage’s location to a property in the Essonne area, south of Paris, and conducted the rescue on Saturday night.
It said he was treated for injuries but gave no details. French media reported that the alleged hostage-takers cut off one of the man’s fingers.
Police detained 5 people — four were in or close to the house where the man was held captive, while the fifth was at the wheel of a vehicle thought to have been used for the alleged abduction, the prosecutor’s office said.
It said the police investigation is looking at an array of possible criminal charges, including kidnapping “with torture or a barbaric act.”
In January, police said a co-founder of French crypto-wallet firm Ledger, David Balland, was also kidnapped with his wife from their home in the region of Cher of central France.
Police said they made 10 arrests and that the alleged kidnappers demanded a ransom in cryptocurrency from another of Ledger’s co-founders.
A raid by France’s elite National Gendarmerie Intervention Group unit that specializes in hostage situations freed Balland the next day, followed the day after that by the liberation, again by the GIGN, of his wife, found tied up in a vehicle, police said.
