Paris Court Gives Ex-Holograph Developer 5 Years Over 1B HLG Mint

A Paris criminal court has sentenced a former Holograph Foundation employee to five years in prison, two of them to be served and three suspended, plus a €600,000 fine. He was convicted of unauthorized access to a data-processing system, organized fraud, money laundering and criminal conspiracy over the creation and diversion of 1 billion HLG tokens worth about $14 million (€12.5 million).

Details

According to French outlets (Titres Presse, Jean-Marc Morandini), the convicted man is a Ukrainian national living in France. Between May and August 2024 he used access left over from his former job to mint tokens and spread them across exchange accounts. He was arrested in Italy and extradited to France in September 2024.

Two accomplices were fined €80,000 and €40,000. All three must jointly pay Holograph Foundation €1.15 million in damages plus another €106,800. The trial opened in October; investigators say about 200 million HLG were sold for just over $1 million, and on June 13, 2024 the token fell almost 80%, from $0.014 to under $0.003.

What this means for the market

The case shows that ex-employees with unrevoked permissions remain a real risk for token projects, and that French courts are willing to hand down real prison time in crypto cases. For holders of smaller tokens, control over a smart contract's minting rights is part of the project's risk.

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