Cross-country scheme to steal cryptocurrency involved fake food orders and violent break-ins, prosecutors say | CNN

It might sound like a tale from the Gold Rush: Three men leave Tennessee hoping to strike it rich in California. But the twists of their saga, as laid out this week in a federal indictment, are closer to a horror story – with pistol-whipping, lives threatened and people tied up in their own homes. And investigators say the men weren’t looking for gold – they sought something you can’t hold or even see. The trio, according to prosecutors, wanted to make quick millions by stealing cryptocurrency, according to an indictment unsealed last month. Federal prosecutors say the defendants — Elijah Armstrong, 21; Nino Chindavanh, 21; and Jayden Rucker, 25 — all from the Nashville area, swept across several California cities in a little more than a month. They are accused of using several ruses to force their way into people’s homes, assaulting unsuspecting residents and holding them hostage for their own money, and demanding access to their crypto accounts. “The scheme was not only sophisticated, it was brazen, violent and dangerous,” US Attorney Craig H. Missakian said in a news release this week. Threatening violence against crypto owners to give up access to their funds