A Chinese woman who masterminded a multibillion-dollar bitcoin scam and evaded authorities for years was sentenced to 11 years and eight months in jail by a UK court Tuesday.

Nicknamed the "goddess of wealth", 47-year-old Zhimin Qian orchestrated a Ponzi scheme that promised investors returns of up to 300 percent, defrauding around 128,000 people in China between 2014 and 2017.

It raised billions of dollars, much of which was converted to bitcoin.

After she came to the UK as a fugitive and during a multiyear investigation where she evaded capture, British police seized 61,000 bitcoin worth more than £5 billion ($6.6 billion), which the force called the largest single cryptocurrency seizure in the world.

She was arrested in the northern English city of York in 2024.

Qian, who pleaded g

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