Arizona Man Pleads Guilty in $13 Million Crypto Fraud

Vincent Anthony Mazzotta Jr. pleaded guilty in federal court in Los Angeles to money laundering and conspiracy to obstruct justice. The Arizona man faces up to 15 years in federal prison and will be sentenced on Dec. 15.

Mazzotta used multiple aliases, including “Vincent Midnight”, “Delta Prime,” and “Director Vinchenzo.” He ran the scheme with co-defendant David Saffron, promising investors high returns from cryptocurrency trading programs called Mind Capital and Cloud9Capital, claiming their automated AI-powered trading robots generated virtually risk-free profits.

Court documents show Mazzotta and Saffron collected more than $13 million from victims through the fake trading platforms and fraudulent recovery services. The defendants never invested any money in actual cryptocurrency assets. Instead, they spent the funds on personal expenses and used blockchain mixers to hide transaction trails.

After investors lost access to their money through the trading platforms, Mazzotta and Saffron created a fake organization called the Federal Crypto Reserve. They charged victims thousands of dollars in fees to “investigate” and recover funds from the vanished platforms.

When authorities arrested Saffron, Mazzotta worked with others to destroy evidence at Saffron’s apartment. They removed an iPad and emptied a safe. According to court filings, Mazzotta also falsified records for his company, Runway Beauty Inc., to hide his involvement from a federal grand jury.

Mazzotta pleaded guilty to one count of money laundering, which carries a maximum 10-year prison sentence, and one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice, punishable by up to five years.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew R. Galeotti said Mazzotta defrauded investors through a sophisticated cryptocurrency scheme and then used a fake government entity to further victimize people who trusted him with their money. U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli for the Central District of California noted that criminals use the relative novelty of new investment types like cryptocurrencies to prey on victims.

The IRS Criminal Investigation unit led the probe into Mazzotta’s operation. Consumer losses to fraud reached $12.5 billion in 2024, representing a 25% increase from the previous year. Investment scams accounted for $5.7 billion of those losses. In the first half of 2025 alone, crypto investors lost nearly $2.5 billion to hacks and scams, according to blockchain security firm CertiK.

A federal judge in the Central District of California will determine Mazzotta’s final sentence based on U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors. Victims can contact the DOJ’s Victim Witness Unit for assistance.