Israeli Pleads Guilty in Munich Trial to Defrauding Germans in Cybercrime Scam

Edited by: TJVNews.com

On the first day of his fraud trial in Munich, Germany, on Tuesday,44-year old Israeli citizen Tal-Jacki Fitelzon pled guilty to charges of defrauding 335 German victims of approximately 8.7 million euros, according to a report on the fintelegram.com web site.

Fitelzon was the co-conspirator and a lieutenant of the cybercrime organization known E&G Bulgaria that was headed up by Gal Barak, also known as the “Wolf of Sofia.” Barak was sentenced to four years in prison in Vienna in September 2020, as was indicated in the fintelegram.com report.

The prosecutor in the case as well as Fitelzon’s attorney agreed on sentencing plan that would include Fitelzon spending anywhere from 78 to 84 months in prison. Final sentencing and prison time will be decided by the judge in the case. The fintelegram.com  report added that the defense attorney said that all the claims of the victims represented by EFRI would be recognized as part of the plea deal. The trial was adjourned to next Friday, however, the prosecutor did have a chance to begin questioning before the adjournment was announced.

Representing the Central Office Cybercrime Bavaria (ZKB) in the trial was Nino Goldbeck.

When Gal Barak was sentenced in the Vienna Cybercrime Trials (VCT) to four years in prison for investment fraud and money laundering, millions of euros were seized and will be paid out to the victims eventually, according to the fintelegram.com report.

Tal-Jacki Fitelzon is considered a ringleader in Barak’s E&G Bulgaria criminal organization and as such, Fitelzon’s trial is focusing on the aggravated commercial fraud that he has been charged with. The maximum penalty for these offenses is 10 years imprisonment and fines.

The E&G Bulgaria organization operated broker scams such as XtraderFX, SafeMarkets, or OptionStarsGlobal, among others. Fitelzon was “Vice President of Sales” and responsible for the day-to-day operations of Barak’s boiler room operations, according to information provided by the fintelegram.com web site.

According to the indictment, as was reported by fintelegram.com, Fitelzon was the chief of operations over all the boiler rooms of this cybercrime organization. Therefore, the prosecution charged him under several statutes of the German Criminal Code. The indictment concluded that as leader of E&G Bulgaria, Fitzelson was responsible for its systematic and intentional fraud activities including money laundering.

When offering his guilty plea at the trial, Fitelzon asked the court to grant him full or partial prison time to be spent in Israel at a rehabilitation center, as was reported by the fintelgram.com web site.  At the trial, the report indicated that Fitelzon tried to give the appearance of being mentally confused. He told of his huge consumption of alcohol and drugs at the time that he was under the employ of Gal Barak and E&G Bulgaria. He said that he was consumed by fear as  he and his family were under threaten and that the management of E&G Bulgaria would have been constantly traveling with bodyguards. He claimed he heard voices in his head.

The prosecutor, Nino Goldbeck inquired of Fitelzon  of how he became involved witho E&G Bulgaria and if Ilan Tzorya was the one who recruited him for the position. Criminal records revealed that Gal Barak claimed that Tzorya recruited Fitelzon for E&G Bulgaria and would have been the “real boss” of this cybercrime organization.

Fitelzon told the prosecutor that he knew Tzorya during the time he spent in the  Israeli army as they had served in the same unit. He did say that he did not come to E&G Bulgaria through Tzorya, but through Barak, as was reported by fintelegram.com. In introductory questions posed by the prosecutor, it turned out that his “full confession” could not be true in the sense of the indictment. FinTelegram reported that they have knowledge that Fitelzon was not responsible for SafeMarkets as they indicted stated. The site also said they also had knowledge that the person who headed the SafeMarkets scam was a contemporary of Fitzelson’s named Chen Ganon, who was also an Israeli citizen. FinTelegram claims Ganon was a drug addict and had confirmed his involvement in SafeMarkets to them.  (Source: FinTelegram.com)