Two California men have been charged with orchestrating a series of NFT rug pulls that totaled more than $22 million bilked from buyers, the U.S. Department of Justice said in an indictment unsealed on Friday. The DOJ said the case is the largest NFT scheme it’s ever prosecuted.

Gabriel Hay of Beverly Hills, and Gavin Mayo of Thousand Oaks are each charged with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, two counts of wire fraud, and one count of stalking. The men were arrested Thursday in Los Angeles.

“For three years, Hay and Mayo apparently lied to their investors in order to defraud them out of millions of dollars,” Katrina W. Berger, executive associate director of Homeland Security Investigations said, in a statement. “Such technological fraud schemes cost investors millions of dollars every year.”

From May 2021 to May 2024, Hay—who went by “Mr. Handz,” “Diamondhandz,” “Centurion,” and “Vaultkeeper”—and Mayo, who went by “Gavinm,” promoted NFT projects using false claims and misleading project roadmaps, the indictment alleged.

A rug pull occurs when a developer creates a token, falsely claims there are plans for future development, sells the token based on these empty promises, and then abruptly v

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Author: Jason Nelson