Colombian police smash $42 million cryptocurrency drug trafficking and money laundering gang involved On October 23rd, according to (Bitcoin.com), the Colombian Attorney General's Office announced on Wednesday that, in coordination with US intelligence agencies, it has arrested 8 individuals suspected of using cryptocurrency to launder money for drug trafficking organizations. The police and military are operating simultaneously in four locations: Kashka, Maikao, Barranquilla, and Bogota. Among them, seven people including the gang leader Guillermo Carpio Cardenas (nicknamed "Gallo") were arrested. The United States District Court for the Federal District of Puerto Rico accuses the gang of concealing the source of drug funds and evading financial intelligence agency monitoring through deposit networks, encrypted tokens, and the splitting of small transactions (smerfing). Another suspect, Nassim Orfale Vasquez, was arrested in Barranquilla and has been charged by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. According to the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS), he has processed over $42 million in suspicious cryptocurrency transactions since 2018, and authorities are investigating whether there are larger money laundering organizations in the coastal areas of Colombia.