The son of a government contractor was arrested in the Caribbean after allegedly stealing more than $46 million in seized cryptocurrency from the US Marshals Service, the FBI says.
John Daghita was arrested in Saint Martin on Wednesday evening, FBI director Kash Patel confirmed, describing it as a joint operation with France’s elite tactical police unit, GIGN.
Patel called Daghita a US government contractor himself, though independent blockchain investigator ZachXBT – who suspects the arrest stemmed directly from his January probe into the man – claims he is the son of the actual contractor.
ZachXBT claimed Daghita, who used the online alias “Lick,” is the son of Dean Daghita, who heads up Command Services & Support (CMDSS), which has one active US government IT contract.
Its current government contract is worth $4 million and is described as a mission-critical task relating to the management of seized assets by the US Marshals Service.
Authorities have not confirmed how John Daghita allegedly exploited this access to transfer the seized cryptocurrency belonging to the US government into his own wallet.
The investigator claims it all started after Daghita and another cryptocurrency enthusiast became involved in a public spat over who had control of the most cryptocurrency.
This spat, hosted on Telegram and recorded by onlookers, led to the identification of wallet addresses controlled by Daghita, and showed transactions between them.
At the time, ZachXBT says he traced the source of the funds, in part, to a previous theft in 2024. Following the Bitfinix hack of 2016, the US government seized a large number of cryptocurrency tokens, some of which were stolen in October 2024.
The recordings suggest that some of the funds allegedly transferred by Daghita may have stemmed from this theft and a number of other seizures.
Days after ZachXBT published his findings, both the US Marshals Service and Patrick Witt, executive director at the President’s Council of Advisors for Digital Assets, said they would investigate the case.
Since the revelations came to light, Dean Daghita’s CMDSS web presence has disappeared: its website has gone private, and social media accounts have been deactivated.
An archived version of the company’s website, however, indicates that it was founded in 2011 and describes itself as “a proven provider of mission-critical services to the Department of Defense and Department of Justice.”
CMDSS advertises services ranging from management strategy and enterprise solutions to systems administration and electronic security.
The Register contacted Dean Daghita for comment.
Patel said: “FBI will continue working 24/7 with our international partners to track down, apprehend, and bring to justice those who attempt to defraud American taxpayers – no matter where they try to hide.” ®