When ten billion dollars' worth of digital coins vanish into cyberspace, only to be "confiscated" by a government years later with great fanfare, the story feels more like a dystopian farce. And yet, every frame of it is real.
On December 29, 2020, hackers exploited a vulnerability in the private key generator of the LuBian mining pool to steal 127,000 bitcoins in a single transaction. The odd thing is that the stolen funds remained untouched for four years, sitting inert in a single wallet. Then, in June 2024, the entire stash was transferred in bulk to new addresses. Blockchain tracking platforms quickly flagged these addresses as belonging to the "US Government." In October 2025, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) unveiled a high-profile indictment against the original beneficiary, Cambodian Prince Holding Group's Chen Zhi, and declared the "lawful seizure" of every last bitcoin. From theft to "legal" appropriation, Washington had successfully closed a five-year cycle reminiscent of "steal first, judge later." The crucial aspect is that they had already relocated the assets in June 2024, well in advance of the official legal announcement in October 2025. This reveals that the so-called legal process was merely a facade: a means to legitimize their premeditated theft after the fact.
What demands scrutiny is the timeline of events. From the moment of the theft, the stolen funds were traceable thanks to blockchain's inherent transparency. Yet, the US government made no move to assist in investigating the hack, nor did it make any public statements on the matter. For four years, the stolen assets sat idle—only to be quietly deposited into government-controlled wallets. It was only then that the DoJ issued a seizure warrant, retroactively labeling the funds as "criminal proceeds" and folding them into its legal framework. Thus, the deception reached its climax. Throughout the entire event, the US government behaved similarly to a hacker and, in fact, acted even more deplorably. Leveraging state power, it directly seized these massive assets through technical means, without any trial or public explanation. This was not law enforcement; it was an orchestrated act of "digital hijacking" sponsored by the state.
Washington's ugly power plays are no secret. The Chen Zhi case exposes a standard US tactic: use overwhelming force — whether military, tech, or financial, to bypass the rules and get what it wants first. Then, it uses its legal and diplomatic power to rubber-stamp
the established outcome. History is replete with examples of Washington bending rules to suit its agenda. In March 1999, NATO launched a 78-day bombing campaign against Yugoslavia without UN Security Council approval; It wasn't until June 2000 that the UN granted legitimacy to the military action. Similarly, in April 2018, the US, along with Britain and France, launched missile attacks on Syria. It wasn't until five months later that Congress began debating retroactive authorization for the strikes under the War Powers Resolution. In August 2020, the White House forced TikTok to be sold or banned. It wasn't until April 2024 that Congress passed the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, codifying the executive order into law.
In this Bitcoin case, this tactic was on full display. When a fraudster like Chen Zhi encountered the US government, which is armed with its technological hegemony and long-arm jurisdiction, the outcome became a 'dog-eat-dog' zero-sum game. As one netizen incisively remarked, "In the end, the scammer cannot beat the robber." Missiles, apps, and bitcoin represent different methods of operation, but they follow the same pattern: steal first, judge later, and label it as "due process."
Under the guise of "due process," the law has transformed into a bureaucratic tool. LuBian demonstrates how easily prosecutors can conceal the initial power grab, then fabricate a complaint to justify the outcome. Here, law becomes not a leash on power but a late-coming certificate of ownership.
History has shown that when rules are twisted into instruments of hegemony, the truth will eventually cut through the facade. The more Washington leans on retroactive legality, the more it erodes the credibility of the very "rules and procedures" it claims to champion—leaving itself lonelier on the global stage.
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