Texas man behind $20 million crypto scam gets 23 years in federal prison from Illinois judge

An Illinois judge has sentenced a Texas man to more than two decades in federal prison for orchestrating a $20 million cryptocurrency scam.

Prosecutors said Robert Dunlap, 55, of Houston, Texas, claimed to own a cryptocurrency business selling a digital asset called Meta-1 Coin through a Meta-1 Coin Trust between 2018 and 2023.

During this time, Dunlap told potential and actual investors that his coin was backed by as much as $1 billion in art and $44 billion in gold, neither of which was true. Dunlap also falsely claimed that the gold had been audited by an accounting firm, which certified its value.

According to prosecutors, Dunlap claimed his art collection contained works by Pablo Picasso, Vincent Van Gogh and Salvador Dali, among other famous artists. Dunlap also created fake documents to hide the fact that he did not possess the gold or the art.

Through his scam, more than 1,000 investors lost more than $20 million; many lost their entire life savings, prosecutors said.

A federal jury in Northern Illinois convicted Dunlap last year on mail fraud charges. This week, a judge sentenced him to 23 years in federal prison and ordered him to pay restitution to the victims he defrauded.