GREEN BAY, Wis. (WBAY) – A federal judge shuts down a request from a former De Pere man who wanted parts of his case reexamined.
Ron Van Den Heuvel, who is now in his early 70s and living in Georgia, sent the letter to the federal court in Green Bay late last month. He was convicted of federal fraud in 2018, after pleading guilty.
Authorities said he defrauded investors of more than $9 million, including more than $1 million from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation, after promoting plans for a business called Green Box, which he said would turn solid waste into energy.
Van Den Heuvel asked the judge to address several issues, but the judge decided there were previous opportunities to argue them.
Van Den Heuvel was initially sentenced to seven and a half years in federal prison.
Copyright 2026 WBAY. All rights reserved.
THE HASHFLARE “CLOUD MINING” PONZI SCHEME (GLOBAL/ESTONIA)
Date: February 13, 2025 (Guilty Pleas) Perpetrators: Sergei Potapenko and Ivan Turogin
Case Description: This $577 million cryptocurrency fraud remains one of the largest digital asset scams in history, with major legal developments concluding in 2025. Potapenko and Turogin operated “Hashflare,” which they marketed as a massive cryptocurrency mining operation. Hundreds of thousands of victims worldwide purchased “mining contracts,” believing they were renting hash power to mine Bitcoin. In reality, the duo was running a sophisticated Ponzi scheme.
They created fake customer dashboards that showed “real-time” mining profits, but the money being paid out was simply the capital of newer investors. They laundered the proceeds through shell companies to purchase luxury real estate and a fleet of high-end vehicles. After a massive international investigation involving the FBI and Estonian authorities, the pair agreed to forfeit over $400 million in assets. This case underscores the “Cyber-enabled Fraud” warning issued by the FATF in early 2026: as technology evolves, the scale of fraud moves from local millions to global billions in the blink of an eye.
Link to Original: ACFE – High Profile Fraud of 2025