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Lucy Letby is “cowardly” for missing her sentencing hearing, the prime minister has said, adding that the government is “looking at” changing the law.

Letby was last week convicted of murdering seven babies and attempting to end the lives of six others while working as a neonatal nurse.

She did not appear in the courtroom today, with the judge set to outline how long she will spend in prison.

Lucy Letby latest: ‘Sadistic’ Letby refusing to leave cells

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Letby sentencing: Van arrives at court

During his trial, Thomas Cashman, the killer of Olivia Pratt-Korbel, did not attend court at points and did not turn up to his sentencing.

Judges have the discretion to compel people to appear before them for sentencing – however, it remains up to prison governors to actually execute this order as it would be their staff who would have to force someone from their cell.

An extra two years can be added to someone’s sentence if they refuse to attend the court.

lucy letby
Image:
Lucy Letby

Rishi Sunak said: “The first thing is to extend my sympathies to everyone affected by this.

“I think, like everyone reading about this, it’s just shocking and harrowing.

“Now, I think it’s cowardly that people who commit such horrendous crimes do not face their victims and hear firsthand the impact that their crimes have had on them and their families and loved ones.

“We are looking and have been at changing the law to make sure that that happens, and that’s something that we’ll bring forward in due course.”

Sir Keir Starmer has vowed to close the “shamefully exploited loophole” which lets convicts miss their time in the dock.

The guidelines were laid out by the Crown Prosecution Service, which Sir Keir would have overseen as director of public prosecutions.

It is not uncommon for people to refuse to leave their cells or report as sick on the date of hearings – even when they are dialing into proceedings virtually from the prison.

Read more:
Bereaved demand new law to force sentencing appearance
Who is Lucy Letby?
The psychology behind healthcare murderers

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Letby sentencing no-show ‘disgusting’

Sir Keir tweeted: “As director of public prosecutions, I saw how crucial it is for victims and their families that perpetrators appear in court.

“That criminals can cowardly hide away is a shamefully exploited loophole, and one Labour will close. Victims must be at the heart of our justice system.”

Minister for Children Claire Coutinho told Sky News “more law is probably required”.

“The justice secretary [Alex Chalk] said he’s very committed to making sure these laws are in place,” she added.

“I think we can all say that these crimes have been some of the most sickening that I’ve seen in my entire lifetime and it’s really important that victims have that moment in court with the perpetrator there and the perpetrator has to face that moment of justice.”

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Labour vows to end sentencing loophole

Pressed on why additional laws are needed, given the powers judges already have, the minister said: “I think there are some changes that it sounds like are needed as well to make sure that in every instance the perpetrator has to go to court.”

Ms Coutinho added that, if Letby gets a whole-life order, adding two years to her sentence for not appearing “might not be enough of an incentive”.

Some in government went further, with one source saying that if Letby requires “lawful enforcement” to be in court, then “so be it”.

“If she continues to refuse that will only strengthen our resolve to change the law as soon as we can,” they added.

Labour has claimed a “number of things” could be done to compel people to attend sentencing.

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Shadow Justice Secretary Ellie Reeves told Sky News: “You could look at things like prison privileges for example… and one of the suggestions we’ve heard is to have the sentencing live-streamed into someone’s cell.”

She said the government had “failed to act” – which will likely lead to Letby not attending court today.

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Trump tariffs squeeze already struggling Bitcoin miners — Braiins exec

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Trump tariffs squeeze already struggling Bitcoin miners — Braiins exec

Trump tariffs squeeze already struggling Bitcoin miners — Braiins exec

The new trade tariffs announced by US President Donald Trump may place added pressure on the Bitcoin mining ecosystem both domestically and globally, according to one industry executive.

While the US is home to Bitcoin (BTC) mining manufacturing firms such as Auradine, it’s still “not possible to make the whole supply chain, including materials, US-based,” Kristian Csepcsar, chief marketing officer at BTC mining tech provider Braiins, told Cointelegraph.

On April 2, Trump announced sweeping tariffs, imposing a 10% tariff on all countries that export to the US and introducing “reciprocal” levies targeting America’s key trading partners.

Community members have debated the potential effects of the tariffs on Bitcoin, with some saying their impact has been overstated, while others see them as a significant threat.

Tariffs compound existing mining challenges

Csepcsar said the mining industry is already experiencing tough times, pointing to key indicators like the BTC hashprice.

Hashprice — a measure of a miner’s daily revenue per unit of hash power spent to mine BTC blocks — has been on the decline since 2022 and dropped to all-time lows of $50 for the first time in 2024.

According to data from Bitbo, the BTC hashprice was still hovering around all-time low levels of $53 on March 30.

Trump tariffs squeeze already struggling Bitcoin miners — Braiins exec

Bitcoin hashprice since late 2013. Source: Bitbo

“Hashprice is the key metric miners follow to understand their bottom line. It is how many dollars one terahash makes a day. A key profitability metric, and it is at all-time lows, ever,” Csepcsar said.

He added that mining equipment tariffs were already increasing under the Biden administration in 2024, and cited comments from Summer Meng, general manager at Chinese crypto mining supplier Bitmars.

Trump tariffs squeeze already struggling Bitcoin miners — Braiins exec

Source: Summer Meng

“But they keep getting stricter under Trump,” Csepcsar added, referring to companies such as the China-based Bitmain — the world’s largest ASIC manufacturer — which is subject to the new tariffs.

Trump’s latest measures include a 34% additional tariff on top of an existing 20% levy for Chinese mining imports. In response, China reportedly imposed its own retaliatory tariffs on April 4.

BTC mining firms to “lose in the short term”

Csepcsar also noted that cutting-edge chips for crypto mining are currently massively produced in countries like Taiwan and South Korea, which were hit by new 32% and 25% tariffs, respectively.

“It will take a decade for the US to catch up with cutting-edge chip manufacturing. So again, companies, including American ones, lose in the short term,” he said.

Trump tariffs squeeze already struggling Bitcoin miners — Braiins exec

Source: jmhorp

Csepcsar also observed that some countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States region, including Russia and Kazakhstan, have been beefing up mining efforts and could potentially overtake the US in hashrate dominance.

Related: Bitcoin mining using coal energy down 43% since 2011 — Report

“If we continue to see trade war, these regions with low tariffs and more favorable mining conditions can see a major boom,” Csepcsar warned.

As the newly announced tariffs potentially hurt Bitcoin mining both globally and in the US, it may become more difficult for Trump to keep his promise of making the US the global mining leader.

Trump’s stance on crypto has shifted multiple times over the years. As his administration embraces a more pro-crypto agenda, it remains to be seen how the latest economic policies will impact his long-term strategy for digital assets.

Magazine: Bitcoin ATH sooner than expected? XRP may drop 40%, and more: Hodler’s Digest, March 23 – 29

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Malta regulator fines OKX crypto exchange $1.2M for past AML breaches

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Malta regulator fines OKX crypto exchange .2M for past AML breaches

Malta regulator fines OKX crypto exchange .2M for past AML breaches

Cryptocurrency exchange OKX is under renewed regulatory scrutiny in Europe after Maltese authorities issued a major fine for violations of Anti-Money Laundering (AML) laws.

Malta’s Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit (FIAU) fined Okcoin Europe — OKX’s Europe-based subsidiary — 1.1 million euros ($1.2 million) after detecting multiple AML failures on the platform in the past, the authority announced on April 3.

While admitting that OKX has significantly improved its AML policies in the past 18 months, the authority “could not ignore” its past compliance failures from 2023, “some of which were deemed to be serious and systematic,” the FIAU notice said.

OKX was among the first crypto exchanges to receive a license under Europe’s new Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation via its Malta hub in January 2025.

The news of the $1.2 million penalty in Malta came after Bloomberg in March reported that European Union regulators were probing OKX for laundering $100 million in funds from the Bybit hack.

Bybit CEO Ben Zhou previously claimed that OKX’s Web3 proxy allowed hackers to launder about $100 million, or 40,233 Ether (ETH), from the $1.5 billion hack that occurred in February.

This is a developing story, and further information will be added as it becomes available.

Magazine: Stablecoin for cyber-scammers launches, Sony L2 drama: Asia Express

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US court fines UAE crypto firm CLS Global $428K for wash trading

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US court fines UAE crypto firm CLS Global 8K for wash trading

US court fines UAE crypto firm CLS Global 8K for wash trading

Authorities in the US state of Massachusetts continue targeting unlawful cryptocurrency market practices, with a local court fining crypto financial services firm CLS Global.

A federal court in Boston on April 2 sentenced CLS Global on criminal charges related to fraudulent manipulation of crypto trading volume, according to an announcement from the Massachusetts US Attorney’s Office.

In addition to a $428,059 fine, the court prohibited CLS Global from offering services in the US for a probation period of three years.

CLS Global, a crypto market maker registered in the United Arab Emirates, in January pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit market manipulation and one count of wire fraud.

CLS agreed to manipulate the FBI’s “trap token” NexFundAI

The charges against CLS Global followed an undercover law enforcement operation involving NexFundAI, a token created by the FBI as part of a sting operation in May 2024.

CLS Global was among at least three firms that took the FBI’s bait and agreed to provide “market maker services” for NexFundAI, including a fraudulent scheme to attract investors to purchase the token.

In October 2024, the Securities and Exchange Commission announced fraud charges against CLS and its employee, Andrey Zhorzhes. The US securities regulator also filed complaints against two other NexFundAI manipulators, Hong Kong-linked ZM Quant Investment and Russia-linked Gotbit Consulting.

CLS Global’s profile

According to CLS Global CEO Filipp Veselov, the company was founded in 2017 to fill in a “huge gap in the market for high-quality market-making solutions and trading consulting.”

Prior to CLS, Veselov worked at the Russian cryptocurrency exchange platform Latoken, which is advertised as a “global digital asset exchange” and has about 370,000 followers on X.

The CLS team also includes chief revenue officer Pavel Singaevskii, who previously served as sales manager at Stex, a crypto platform that reportedly ceased operations without warning in 2023.

US court fines UAE crypto firm CLS Global $428K for wash trading

Source: CLS Global

According to CLS Global’s X page, the platform continues operating and has more than 110,000 followers at the time of publication.

How much wash trading is in crypto?

Wash trading is an illegal practice involving artificially inflating trading volume by repeatedly buying and selling the same asset, generating a misleading perception of demand.

According to a January 2025 report by the US blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis, the crypto market has at least $2.6 billion in estimated wash traded volumes, or just about 2% of total daily crypto trading volumes, as reported by CoinGecko.

US court fines UAE crypto firm CLS Global $428K for wash trading

Estimated wash trade volume in crypto. Source: Chainalysis

Related: Russian Gotbit founder strikes $23M plea deal with US prosecutors

Some studies indicate that wash trading makes up a bigger share of the crypto market.

In 2022, the US National Bureau of Economic Research reported that illegal wash trading may account for as much as 70% of average trading volumes on unregulated exchanges.

Magazine: Financial nihilism in crypto is over — It’s time to dream big again

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