US Authorities Charge Trio Over $6.5M Crypto Wrench Attacks

US authorities have unsealed an indictment against three men accused of stealing at least $6.5 million in a “violent robbery spree targeting cryptocurrency owners.”

The Justice Department said in a statement Monday that a federal grand jury indicted three men for allegedly planning to kidnap and rob four people around San Francisco and Los Angeles for their crypto.

The trio, Elijah Armstrong, Nino Chindavanh and Jayden Rucker, are alleged to have posed as delivery drivers to force their way into residences and use threats of violence to extract crypto seed phrases.

So-called wrench attacks, where crypto owners are subject to physical threats, have increased globally since 2025. French authorities charged 88 people in April with committing attacks against local crypto owners.

US prosecutors claimed they identified at least four people the trio targeted from Nov. 22 until Dec. 31. One of the people was allegedly forced to transfer $6.5 million in crypto to a wallet controlled by the trio, according to an unsealed indictment filed in a San Francisco federal court.

One of the victims was allegedly forced to transfer $6.5 million in crypto to the attackers. Source: PACER 

“These individuals, as alleged, terrorized their victims in the hopes of stealing vast sums of cryptocurrency,” Craig Missakian, the US Attorney for the Northern District of California, said in a statement Monday. “The scheme was not only sophisticated, it was brazen, violent, and dangerous.”

Related: Law enforcement freezes $41M connected to $150M crypto Ponzi collapse 

Source: FBI San Francisco

The three men were arrested in December last year and face charges of conspiracy to commit robbery, conspiracy to commit kidnapping, attempted robbery, and attempted kidnapping.

Armstrong and Rucker are scheduled to appear in court on Tuesday. Chindavanh is scheduled to appear in court on June 26.

Blockchain intelligence company TRM Labs reported in May last year that wrench attacks have been on the rise because of the ease with which bad actors can gather personal data online, the perceived pseudonymity of crypto transactions and the public visibility of wealth in the crypto sector.

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