A fixer for a Chinese fraudster behind a £5.5billion Bitcoin scam has handed over £5.6million to the British Government – as it continues to tussle with China over his boss's vastly larger fortune.
Hok Seng Ling, 48, was ordered to surrender the money after admitting his role in the biggest money laundering scam in UK history.
He served as a 'butler' to Zhimin Qian, who masterminded a Ponzi scheme that defrauded more than 128,000 Chinese investors between 2014 and 2017 before funnelling the proceeds into Bitcoin and fleeing to the UK.
Ling, a Malaysian national living in Matlock, Derbyshire, helped the 'Bitcoin Queen' launder her ill-gotten gains and evade British police by booking Airbnbs and arranging helpers.
After admitting money laundering offences, he was jailed for four years and 11 months at Southwark Crown Court in November.
A judge later made a confiscation order for £5,603,305, with most of the sum made up of cryptocurrency seized when Ling was arrested.
A freedom of information request by the Mail to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) shows the full sum has now been recovered, along with a further £1,990 in interest.
It comes amid a high-stakes legal battle over the fate of 61,000 Bitcoin seized by the Met during its investigation into Qian. The haul has since soared in value to £3.8billion as the price of Bitcoin has climbed.
Lawyers representing the Chinese victims of the scam are now fighting in the English courts to stop the Treasury from keeping the gains on the cryptocurrency, which is currently held in UK Government accounts.
Hok Seng Ling, 48, was forced to pay back £5.6million after admitting his role in the biggest money laundering scam in UK history
He served as a 'butler' to fraudster Qian Zhimin, who hid in Britain for more than six years after swindling 128,000 investors in a wealth management Ponzi scheme in China
Central to the dispute is whether English or Chinese law should govern the scam victims' claims.
English law is generally seen as more favourable to victims because it may allow them to argue that all of the seized Bitcoin rightfully belongs to them, rather than limiting their claim to the amount they originally invested.
Last week, Mr Justice Sir Mark Turner ruled that Chinese law should govern their claims, increasing the likelihood that the British state could retain a substantial share of the Bitcoin's increase in value.
Backing arguments made by lawyers for the CPS, the judge said: 'The relevant damage occurred in China. The applicants parted with their money in China. The alleged fraudulent representations were made in China.'
He added: 'The contractual relationships thereby induced were entered into in China. The immediate economic consequences of the alleged wrongdoing were likewise suffered in China.'
While the judge insisted his ruling was not about who will ultimately own the Bitcoin, it makes it harder for victims to claim it.
The investors will now have to show they have legal ownership rights over the Bitcoin under Chinese law. The English court must then decide whether those rights are strong enough under English law for the assets to be returned to them.
Under UK proceeds of crime laws, victims can stop the government keeping seized criminal assets only if they can show they legally belong to them.
If the investors fail to prove their ownership of the Bitcoin under Chinese law, much of it could remain with the UK state.
The CPS has previously said victims can instead be compensated through a scheme run in China.
Qian rented this £17,300-a-month property in Hampstead, London alongside accomplice Jian Wen - where she was later traced by police
Piles of cash discovered during police searches connected to Wen
The case will not be transferred to China. Instead, unless the ruling is overturned on appeal, the High Court in London will hear evidence from legal experts on Chinese law before deciding who should own the Bitcoin.
The CPS said in a statement: 'There will be a further hearing to determine the application of the law and if any of the victims are able to establish an interest in the bitcoin.'
After carrying out the fraud, Qian entered the UK using false documents in 2017.
She then attempted to launder the proceeds by purchasing property, with the assistance of associate Jian Wen.
She first came to police attention in 2018, when police seized 61,000 Bitcoin from Wen's £5million mansion in Hampstead, which she moved into within weeks of arriving in the UK as a takeaway worker with just £5,000 to her name.
The Met did not realise the devices they had seized contained Bitcoin until 2021, by which point Qian had vanished. It is thought to be the largest law-enforcement Bitcoin seizure ever.
She was not charged until April 2024 after she was arrested in York.
Qian emerged from relative obscurity to run a Chinese company called Tianjin Lantian Gerui Electronic Technology, launched in March 2014.
The firm sold investment products with promised returns of up to 300 per cent. In reality, she was simply funnelling her investors' money into Bitcoin for her own enrichment.
Jian Wen, another accomplice, is pictured in a trip to Germany. Zhimin Qian would travel with her on holidays in order to evade the authorities
Qian, who called herself the 'Goddess of Wealth', hoped that her vast Bitcoin fortune would provide a gateway to Britain's Royal Family.
From her rented manor house in Hampstead, Qian formulated plans to snap up a portfolio of million-pound mansions in the UK so she could meet dukes and duchesses, the Dalai Lama and the Pope.
In a diary, she wrote of her ambitions to rule a kingdom in Liberland, an unrecognised micronation on the Danube, where she hoped to build the biggest Buddhist temple in Europe.
The conwoman managed to evade authorities by using multiple aliases and passports to travel around the world on lavish shopping sprees, blowing more than £44,000 on diamond jewellery in Zurich, £90,000 in Harrods on designer clothing and buying watches worth £119,000 from Van Cleef & Arpels.
She rented a remote hideaway in Scotland, a house in York and a £5million mansion in Hampstead where she spent her time scheming in her bedroom while a retinue of domestic staff, including a butler, housekeeper and driver, catered to her every whim.
Qian instructed staff to buy £500,000 apartments for her in Dubai and looked into buying a £10million 18th-century Tuscan villa with a sea view.
But her grand ambitions to rub shoulders with royals and the rich and famous proved her undoing when attempts to buy a £23.5million seven-bedroom Hampstead mansion with a swimming pool, and a nearby £12.5million home with a cinema and gym, triggered money-laundering checks.
Footage showed officers arresting her while she was lying in bed.
Her assistant, Wen, was convicted of money laundering and jailed for six years in 2024.