A federal jury in Alexandria, Virginia, convicted Jihoon Park, 52, of Chantilly, Virginia, on Tuesday, September 8, 2026, for his role in a scheme that defrauded investors and a U.S. Bankruptcy Court, according to the Department of Justice.

"Jihoon Park claimed he would invest his community members' life savings, retirement, and money and promised a high-yield return. Instead, he stole the millions of dollars entrusted to him to enrich himself," said Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department's Criminal Division. "Unsuspecting families and individuals suffered devastating financial crises because of Park's crimes. The Criminal Division's White Collar Section is using every available resource to stop criminals from destroying people's livelihoods and retirements."

According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Park convinced people in his community to let him invest their money and grow their assets. He used his personal relationships and his former affiliation with a large national financial institution to gain victims' trust and convince them to give him money to invest on their behalf.

Park promised safe investments with high returns, but he lied. Instead, he transferred over $2.5 million from multiple victims to himself, using the stolen money to buy a house and cryptocurrency for his own benefit, court records show.

When one of the victims sued him, Park transferred assets to his wife and concealed millions of dollars in cryptocurrency holdings before filing for bankruptcy. He then falsely claimed he had only $0.34 in financial assets and no cryptocurrency, in an effort to avoid repaying his victim creditors, according to the original release.

Park was convicted of three counts of wire fraud and two counts of bankruptcy fraud. He is scheduled to be sentenced on December 10, 2026, and faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison on each wire fraud count and up to five years on each bankruptcy fraud count. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

The FBI's Washington Field Office investigated the case. Trial Attorney Timothy J. Coley of the Criminal Division's White Collar and Corporate Enforcement Section and Trial Attorney Zachary H. Ray of the National Fraud Enforcement Division's Health Care Fraud Section are prosecuting the case, with substantial assistance from Assistant U.S. Attorneys Russell L. Carlberg and Jack Morgan of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.