A criminal court in Paris has sentenced Ukrainian citizen Vitaliy K. to five years in prison and imposed a €600,000 fine over the illegal minting of 1 billion HLG tokens tied to the Holograph project. Prosecutors valued the tokens at about $14 million, according to the case details reported by local media.

The court found him guilty of unauthorized interference with an information system, fraud committed as part of an organized group, money laundering, and criminal conspiracy. Under the ruling, two years of the sentence are to be served in prison, while three years were suspended.

How the HLG token case unfolded

The case centered on the minting of 1 billion HLG tokens from the Holograph project. Investigators said the attackers exploited access to the project’s infrastructure, changed the terms governing token issuance, and then distributed the newly created tokens to wallets linked to exchanges.

Part of the minted supply was sold, and the incident was followed by a decline in HLG’s price. In response, the Holograph team froze assets and later burned tokens in an effort to restore the token’s supply.

Sentences for the defendants

Alongside Vitaliy K., two accomplices were also sentenced to prison terms and financial penalties. The source article did not specify their names or the exact length of their sentences, but it said the court imposed both custodial punishments and fines.

The main defendant had been held in custody in France since September 2024 after being extradited there. His lawyer described the outcome as satisfactory and said the ruling could allow for his release in the coming months.

Cross-border arrests and prosecution

The arrests in the case were carried out in August 2024 in Italy with the involvement of French law enforcement. After that operation, the main suspect was transferred to France, where the case proceeded before the Paris court.

The prosecution treated the matter as more than a technical breach, securing convictions that included fraud, money laundering, and conspiracy in addition to unauthorized access to an information system. That combination reflected the court’s view that the token minting and subsequent movement of assets formed part of an organized scheme.

What the court did not attribute to the defendants

Although the attack was followed by a drop in HLG’s market price, the court did not hold the defendants responsible for the token’s later devaluation. According to the report, the judges noted that price fluctuations had already been occurring before the incident.

That means the ruling addressed the unauthorized minting, movement, and sale of tokens, but stopped short of legally tying the broader market decline in HLG to the defendants’ actions. The confirmed next development may be the main defendant’s release timeline, which his lawyer indicated could come within months.

Source: incrypted.com