Surveillance footage has caught the dramatic escape of an Italian tourist from a New York City townhouse where he had been kidnapped and tortured for over two weeks.
Michael Valentino Teofrasto Carturan, 28, managed to make his way down a bustling SoHo street last Friday, having fled from a luxurious six-story apartment where he was reportedly held captive, subjected to electrocution, and threatened with a chainsaw for a harrowing 17 days.
In a desperate bid for freedom, Carturan, who was bloodied and without shoes, stopped a NYPD traffic officer at the corner of Spring and Mulberry Streets, pleading for assistance, according to NBC 4.
The disheveled Italian tourist told the officer he had seized the opportunity to escape after being told it would be his ‘death day’. Police said he was covered in bruises, cuts and had ligature marks on his wrists from where he was allegedly bound.
Officers converged on the property and arrested John Woeltz, the so-called ‘Crypto King of Kentucky’, on charges of assault, kidnapping, unlawful imprisonment, and criminal possession of a firearm.
Woeltz, 38, was allegedly part of a group that concocted a sadistic scheme to lure Carturan – who is understood to have been a business partner of Woeltz and his associate William Duplessie – to New York so they could access his crypto account.
Duplessie, alongside his lawyers, surrendered himself to police Tuesday morning and is expected to face charges, officials told NBC 4. It is currently unclear what his involvement was in the case.
Woeltz’s glamorous Italian assistant Beatrice Folchi, 24, was also taken into police custody, but later released. The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office has declined to prosecute pending further investigation.
Police raided Woeltz’s residence on Friday after Carturan after claimed to have escaped the house where he alleged he had been held captive since May 6.
Investigators said they found a trove of evidence inside the property, including Polaroid pictures of Carturan being tied up and tortured.
Detectives recovered several torture items from the home, as well as a gun that law enforcement sources told NBC 4 was used to ‘inflict fear and pain on the victim’.
Carturan claimed he had been lured to the house by his former business associate, Woeltz, with the promise of returning Bitcoin already extorted from him.
But when he arrived, Carturan claims, he was chained up, electrocuted, pistol-whipped and threatened with a chainsaw in an effort to give up the passwords to his crypto accounts.
Woeltz and his male ‘accomplice’ allegedly threatened to kill the alleged victim’s family unless he provided passwords to accounts holding Bitcoin.
Believing he would soon be shot, Carturan told his alleged captors he would give up his password. Prosecutors claim as Woeltz went to retrieve his laptop from another room, the victim fled down the stairs.
Carturan was transported to a nearby hospital with ‘laceration to his face’, ‘injury to his wrists consistent with being bound’ and various other injuries on his body and head, prosecutors said, describing the victim as having been ‘traumatized’.
Sources close to the investigation told the news outlet that Woeltz and Duplessie had ‘roughed up’ Carturan before, but never violently.
They would often pick on him, with the insider describing their relationship as ‘complex’ and having a ‘Wolf of Wall Street/frat guys gone wild’ vibe.
Police have arrested a group of so-called ‘crypto bros’ in connection with the case.
The gang were alleged to have pistol-whipped Carturan and threatened to sever off his limbs with an electric chainsaw before he pretended to concede his passwords.
At one point, they were said to have ‘carried the victim to the top flight of stairs of the apartment in the compound and hung the victim over the ledge, after threatening to kill the victim if [he] did not provide the defendant with the victim’s Bitcoin password’.
Police said the men took Polaroid photographs of themselves torturing him – one showing him bound to a chair with a gun pressed to his head.
The photos, authorities believe, were likely intended to extort money from either the alleged victim or his family back in Italy.
Investigators also found broken glass, helmets, night vision goggles and a bullet proof vest strewn across the apartment.
The men also reportedly forced him into taking drugs – including crack cocaine – and imposed mental torment upon him, repeatedly insisting he would never escape.
Prosecutors also allege that he was urinated on during the ordeal, and that his captors slashed his leg.
Woeltz, described by police as the renting occupant of the apartment, was dragged out of the building in a white bath robe on Friday morning. Officers found him in an upstairs bathroom.
He was charged on Saturday with kidnapping, assault, unlawful imprisonment and criminal possession of a firearm, according to the Manhattan DA’s office.
Prosecutors deemed him a flight risk as he owns a private jet and a helicopter. He is being held without bail.
Duplessie surrendered himself to the NYPD’s Major Case Squad Detectives unit on Tuesday morning. The custody exchange was reportedly expected.
Authorities say Duplessie is expected to face charges.
