The FBI searched the home of cryptocurrency mogul Jesse Powell in March following allegations that the founder of the Kraken exchange hacked and cyberstalked a nonprofit organization he had also founded, according to reports. from The New York Times.
The criminal investigation focused on allegations that Powell, 42, interfered with digital accounts and blocked access to communications from the Verge Center for the Arts. Powell founded Verge, a contemporary art space in Sacramento, California, in 2008.
Agents searched Powell's Los Angeles home and seized his electronic devices, but Powell has not been charged with any wrongdoing.
Powell was removed from the Verge board of directors in 2022, shortly after alleged reports who tried to start a "culture war" among employees with "hurtful" comments about race and gender at the Kraken offices.
The Verge alleged that Powell then blocked his staff from accessing his site and emails, and accessing sensitive information.
A Kraken spokeswoman told The Times that the Verge investigation had nothing to do with the cryptocurrency exchange and that Kraken had no reason to believe that prosecutors were looking into other potential issues.
Powell's lawyer also told The Times that the investigation is unrelated to Powell's cryptocurrency activity and denied the allegations of hacking and cyberstalking.
Kraken is the second largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world after Coinbase. Kraken has survived despite crackdowns by federal investigators against several of its competitors, the most infamous of which was FTX's collapse after fraud charges against its founder, Sam Bankman-Fried, in December 2022.
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