Federal prosecutors investigating a global money-laundering ring found $20 million tucked away in the box spring under a mattress in Massachusetts.
Brazilian Cleber Rene Rizerio Rocha was arrested on Jan. 4 for conspiring to commit money laundering as a result of the raid, according to The Guardian.
Rocha allegedly used TelexFree to create a pyramid scheme in which people signed up to be promoters of the Marlborough, Massachusetts-based company and post online ads for internet telecom services that made little or no money for the company.
The telephony company owed $5 billion to its “promoters” when it filed for bankruptcy in April 2014. An estimated 965,000 victims in Brazil, the United States, and other countries lost money when the company went bankrupt, The Guardian reported.
American founder James Merrill was arrested in May 2014, while Brazilian co-founder Carloz Wanzeler fled to Brazil, where he did not face extradition. But even after TelexFree was shut down, the money laundering continued, according to The Guardian.
An intermediary of Wanzeler’s nephew met with a cooperating witness about the money-laundering operation, and investigators were able to set up a meeting between Rocha acting as a courier for Wanzeler, and the witness, after which they followed him to a Westborough, Massachusetts, apartment, The Guardian reported.
Rocha could get up to 20 years in prison for the money-laundering charge, according to CNN. Carloz Wanzeler is still at large in Brazil.
Wanzeler’s plan was to launder the money through Hong Kong and then into Brazil, according to federal investigators, CNN reported.
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