Pastor, wife who sold cryptocurrency indicted on fraud charges
Online pastor Eligio “Eli” Regalado and his wife, Kaitlyn, who led Victorious Grace Church, were indicted on 40 counts of fraud by a grand jury in Denver, Colorado, in connection with an alleged cryptocurrency scam they claim God told them to operate.
Colorado Securities Commissioner Tung Chan filed civil fraud charges against the Regalados, along with INDXcoin, LLC, Kingdom Wealth Exchange, LLC, and others for allegedly violating the anti-fraud, licensing and registration provisions of the Colorado Securities Act.
The couple had sold a cryptocurrency they called “INDXcoin” to their Christian followers, claiming that it would make them rich.
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According to The Denver Post, Eligio Regalado told his followers that “the Lord brought this cryptocurrency to me. He (God) said, ‘Take this to my people for a wealth transfer.’
“It is coming, people,” he added, declaring at the time that “many of you very soon are going to have more money than you’ve ever had in your life by participating in this crypto.”
Prosecutors allege in court documents that investigators from the Colorado Division of Securities found that from June 2022 to April 2023, INDXcoin raised nearly $3.2 million from more than 300 individuals who were recruited as investors from Christian communities in Denver.
“These charges mark a major step forward in our work to hold the Regalados accountable for their alleged crimes and to bring a measure of justice to the victims,” Denver District Attorney John Walsh said in a statement on Monday.
“The red flags were their expenses for personal purposes,” Ioana Dobra, a fraud investigator with the Colorado Division of Securities, said about an audit of the couple’s bank accounts. The audit found that the couple had spent some of the money on “jewelry purchases, vacations, airline tickets, clothing, and home remodeling.”
Even after authorities shut down INDXcoin and Kingdom Wealth Exchange, Regalado insisted to investors that God had everything under control while he splurged around $1.3 million on personal expenses.
Regalado also insisted that he was simply following what he believed to be God’s voice.
“There’s been $1.3 million that’s been taken out of, I think it was, a total of $3.4 million. But out of that $1.3, half a million dollars went to the IRS, and a few hundred thousand went to a home remodel that the Lord told us to do,” Regalado said in a nine-minute video to his followers that was reset to private last year.
“We sold a cryptocurrency with no clear exit. We did,” he told viewers. “We took God at His word and sold a cryptocurrency with no clear exit. And so, the prosecutors have to take that and say, ‘These people willingly sold a cryptocurrency with no clear exit.’ What we’re praying for and what we’re believing for still is that God is going to do a miracle. God is going to work a miracle in the financial sector.”
In May, Regalado and his wife argued in court filings from a civil court bench trial cited by the Denver Gazette that they believed INDXcoin was a “utility coin” to join faith-based communities and not a security. As a result of that claim, the couple argued that they did not need to license or register their cryptocurrency.
The Colorado Securities Commissioner is seeking a permanent injunction, a freeze on the Regalados’ assets and $3.4 million in restitution against the couple.
“We allege that Mr. Regalado took advantage of the trust and faith of his own Christian community and that he peddled outlandish promises of wealth to them when he sold them essentially worthless cryptocurrencies,” Chan‘s office said in a statement in January.
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