The US government now has legal ownership of more than $400 million in seized cryptocurrency, real estate and cash linked to the once-popular darknet bitcoin mixing service Helix, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced Thursday. Commingling services like Helix are designed to hide the origin and destination of crypto transactions by pooling and redistributing funds, a practice that has long been scrutinized by law enforcement and regulators. The DOJ alleged that Helix was particularly used by drug traffickers and other criminals to launder money.
According to court documents, Helix was among the most widely used mixing services on the darknet, particularly by online drug dealers trying to launder illegal profits. Investigators said Helix processed at least 354,468 bitcoins, worth about $300 million at the time, much of it tied to darknet drug markets. Helix’s operator, Larry Dean Harmon, charged commissions and fees on these transactions.
Harmon pleaded guilty in August 2021 to conspiracy to commit money laundering and was sentenced in November 2024 to 36 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, along with a forfeiture of money and forfeiture of seized property order.
Harmon also ran Grams, a darknet search engine designed to connect users to large darknet markets. Helix’s application programming interface (API) allowed darknet marketplaces to integrate the mixer directly into their bitcoin withdrawal systems, enabling seamless
Since 2020, the DOJ Criminal Division’s Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section (CCIPS) has secured more than 180 cybercrime convictions and court orders for restitution of over $350 million in victim funds, according to the Justice Department.
