Movie2k boss could end money-laundering trial a billionaire
Leipzig court proposes dropping the case for 40,000 more Bitcoin, six million euros in film earnings became coins worth 6.8 billion
Images
Richter Karsten Nickel (Mitte) beim Prozessauftakt im Februar 2026 in LeipzigFoto: Silvio Buerger
Foto: Silvio Buerger
Mit der Streaming-Plattform movie2k.to wurde ein Vermögen verdientFoto: Pr
Foto: Pr
The presiding judge at Leipzig Regional Court has proposed settling the money-laundering trial of the suspected Movie2k operator with Bitcoin: the accused transfers a further 40,000 coins, worth around 2.6 billion euros, and in return the proceedings are discontinued — leaving him holdings worth more than 1.1 billion euros, the Leipziger Volkszeitung reports.
Josef F., 42, has stood trial since February for commercial money laundering in 146 cases. The indictment reaches back to movie2k.to, a streaming site that offered films illegally from 2008 to 2013 and at its peak drew up to 2.5 million visitors a day. The site earned roughly six million euros, and prosecutors say the proceeds were invested in 136,000 Bitcoin, bought when a coin cost a few cents or a few euros. Those coins are now worth around 6.8 billion.
The authorities already hold 49,858 of them. In January 2024, Josef F. transferred that many Bitcoin to investigators to avoid pre-trial detention, and presiding judge Karsten Nickel's proposal would add another 40,000 — nearly doubling the state's holding. If the chamber accepts, the proceedings could be provisionally discontinued as early as one of the next hearing dates, with the defendant given two weeks to deliver the coins.
Behind the offer lies a problem of proof. Nickel told the court that a mixing of legal and illegal Bitcoin in the accounts is conceivable, and the chamber questions whether all the coins actually stem from the streaming business. Money-laundering cases turn on tracing funds back to a crime; after more than a decade, the trail behind 136,000 coins is no longer clean enough for a verdict, so the court has proposed dividing the pile instead.
The arithmetic inverted along the way. What began as a case over six million euros in streaming proceeds is now a negotiation over the division of a fortune. Movie2k shut down in 2013. If the chamber follows its presiding judge, the proceedings over its earnings will end without a verdict, and Josef F. will remain a billionaire.