Virginia man sentenced to over 30 years for crypto transfers to support ISIS

A United States resident has been sentenced to over 30 years in prison for sending cryptocurrency to support the Islamic State terrorist organization.Mohammed Azharuddin Chhipa, a 35-year-old from Springfield, Virginia, was handed a sentence of 30 years and four months by a federal judge on May 7. According to the Department of Justice, Chhipa sent more than $185,000 to ISIS operatives over a three-year period, helping fund escape operations and combat efforts in Syria. Prosecutors said he played a key role in moving funds through cryptocurrency to conceal their origins and avoid detection.Chhipa’s sentencing comes after a federal jury convicted him in December 2024 on one count of conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization and four counts of providing or attempting to provide such support.The DOJ described him as a key financial facilitator who used social media to raise money and then converted those funds into crypto before sending them to intermediaries in TurkeyFrom there, the money was smuggled across the border into Syria to reach ISIS fighters and female supporters stuck in detention camps.The DOJ said Chhipa’s actions helped bolster ISIS’s operational capacity. His primary contact during the scheme was a British-born ISIS member based in Syria known for planning terror attacks and orchestrating breakouts.Prosecutors said Chhipa used various tactics to hide his activity, including misspelled email accounts and aliases when buying travel tickets, and even attempted to flee the U.S. during the investigation.He traveled through multiple countries, including Mexico, Guatemala, Panama, and Germany, before he was stopped in Egypt and returned to the U.S. under an Interpol Blue Notice.According to U.S. Attorney Erik S. Siebert, “Chhipa knowingly and persistently collected and provided a considerable amount of money to fund the violence of an organization bent on forcing their extremist ideology on others.”The May 7 sentencing is the latest in a growing series of U.S. enforcement actions targeting the use of cryptocurrency in terrorist financing. Authorities have ramped up efforts to dismantle digital funding networks linked to groups like ISIS, Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis. Last month, the DOJ seized over $200,000 in cryptocurrency tied to Hamas operations, part of a broader scheme that laundered over $1.5 million since October 2024. The U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control has also been actively targeting wallets associated with sanctioned entities. In April the agency, blacklisted eight crypto addresses used by the Houthis to fund arms purchases and evade sanctions.U.S. enforcement agencies continue to stress that disrupting financial pipelines is key to weakening terror groups’ capabilities.