A Turkish court overturned a previous verdict that Thodex CEO Faruk Fatih Özer and his two brothers were guilty of creating a criminal organization. The court overturned guilty verdicts for 16 defendants, but only 4 of them were completely acquitted and released.
Faruk and the Özer brothers were sentenced to 11,196 years for charges like aggravated fraud and money laundering in addition to this organized crime charge. They will remain in prison, although they demand a retrial.
Faruk Özer’s Thodex Rug Pull
Faruk Fatih Özer founded the exchange Thodex with his brothers Güven and Serap, and they committed one of the biggest rug pulls in crypto history. Together, they reportedly stole around $2 billion in crypto, and Faruk remained at large after his brothers’ arrest.
However, in 2022, he was caught in Albania and later extradited to Turkey.
This monumental theft impacted hundreds of thousands of users and damaged the industry’s broader reputation, so prosecutors tried to throw the book at these brothers. They tried to give Faruk and 20 other Thodex employees sentences of up to 40,000 years.
These men were found guilty, and the former CEO was sentenced to 11,196 years. However, this sentencing didn’t end the legal battle.
According to local media, an appeal launched by Faruk and the other Thodex executives has finally yielded results. The 22nd Criminal Chamber of the Istanbul Regional Court of Justice overturned several of these convictions.
This week, 16 defendants were cleared of the aggravated fraud charge, and four were released outright. The Özer brothers, however, were not so lucky.
“Overturning the local court’s verdict, the Chamber ruled that the defendants Faruk Fatih Özer, Güven Özer and Serap Özer be released separately on charges of establishing a criminal organization. The Chamber ruled that the defendants should remain in custody for other crimes and sent the file back to the local court,” local reports claimed.
In other words, Faruk and the top-level Thodex executives are still on the hook. Nonetheless, the Özer brothers’ legal team is demanding a retrial, alleging that public perception and media narratives contributed to the long sentence.
For example, although news reports initially claimed thefts around $2 billion, today’s indictment asserts that they only stole $7 million.
“Those who want to get rich overnight in crypto will get scammed by thodex. They buy the shares of companies whose worth is unknown at inflated prices on the stock exchange and go bankrupt,” popular Turkish investor Efe Yakup Karahanlı wrote back in 2024.
For now, it’s unclear exactly how long Faruk Özer and the remaining Thodex employees will actually stay in prison. For example, a few of the named lesser charges still carried sentences of 6-18 years.
There is a chance that some of these men may be released from prison during their lifetime, but even that is unlikely.
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