A 22-year-old from St. Louis pleaded guilty in Hartford federal court to conspiracy to interfere with commerce by robbery tied to an attempted Bitcoin theft, a Lamborghini Urus carjacking, and the kidnapping of two people in Danbury, Connecticut.
Saif Faiq faces up to 20 years in prison for his role in the scheme. He is scheduled for sentencing on August 28. His brother, Adam Iza, pleaded guilty on June 1 to a Hobbs Act robbery conspiracy charge related to the same incident.
Faiq helped recruit participants, coordinate with Iza, and conduct surveillance on the victims, according to court filings. The two kidnapping victims were parents of an individual who participated in a separate Bitcoin theft. Prosecutors characterized the case as a proxy-targeting operation in which relatives were kidnapped and coerced to access cryptocurrency held by another person.
Wrench Attacks Surge in U.S. Federal Courts
The guilty pleas mark an expansion of “wrench attacks” from Europe into American criminal courts. A wrench attack is a physical coercion crime in which perpetrators force victims to surrender passwords, private keys, or access to digital assets.
Security research firm CertiK documented 72 verified wrench-attack incidents in 2025, a 75% increase year over year, according to its 2025 Skynet Wrench Attacks Report. From January through April 2026, CertiK recorded 34 verified incidents, with estimated losses of $101 million. Europe accounted for 28 of those 34 incidents, or 82% of the visible total.
France has emerged as a particular hotspot. Prior coverage described a shift in France from targeting visible founders and executives toward private individuals and homes. The pattern reflects a broader strategy among criminal networks to leverage family members and relatives as entry points to cryptocurrency holdings.
Separate Theft Connection
Prosecutors connected the Danbury case to a separate theft involving hundreds of millions of dollars in Bitcoin.
In a related development, six individuals charged in connection with a carjacking and kidnapping in Florida in September 2024 pleaded guilty in June 2026, according to a Department of Justice statement. The DOJ did not provide details on the individual roles of those defendants or their sentences.
Escalating Physical Threat Landscape
The guilty pleas underscore a documented shift in crypto crime tactics. Rather than targeting digital infrastructure or exchange accounts, criminal networks are increasingly employing physical violence and kidnapping to coerce asset transfers. The victims in these cases are often family members or associates of individuals holding significant cryptocurrency.
CertiK’s 2026 Wrench Attacks Overview noted that the incidents tracked in early 2026 represent only verified cases. The actual number of wrench attacks may be substantially higher, as many victims do not report incidents to law enforcement or security researchers.
Faiq’s case is among the first major federal prosecutions in the United States to explicitly charge wrench-attack conspiracy. The conviction signals that U.S. prosecutors are treating organized physical crypto theft as a federal crime worthy of substantial prison sentences.
