A London man has been sentenced to two and a half years in prison for his role in a SIM-swap scheme that stole almost £200,000 worth of cryptocurrency from four victims. Ajay Shinjin, 25, also known as AJ Marley Cruz, received more than £44,000 of the proceeds and spent the money on Dubai holidays, a high-end apartment in Canary Wharf and gold-plated teeth grills.
According to Decrypt, Shinjin was sentenced at Inner London Crown Court after pleading guilty on September 28 to conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation and transferring criminal property. The City of London Police described the operation as “complex and calculated.”
How the SIM-swap scheme worked
SIM swapping is a form of account takeover in which criminals arrange for a mobile phone number to be moved from its legitimate SIM card to one under their control. Once the transfer is completed, calls and text messages intended for the victim can reach the criminals instead.
That can be particularly damaging when banks or cryptocurrency platforms use text messages to deliver one-time passcodes. By intercepting those codes, attackers may be able to get through an additional security check and access an account.
In early November 2021, BT identified unauthorized activity involving customer phone numbers that had been moved to SIM cards controlled by criminals. The telecommunications company traced the devices used to receive the numbers, and information from that work helped police identify several suspects. Shinjin was linked to four of the devices.
Four victims and more than £44,000 received
The police investigation identified several cryptocurrency transfers connected to Shinjin. One victim lost about £40,000 in crypto on November 2, 2021, with approximately £27,000 later reaching Shinjin’s personal crypto account. In a second case, the victim’s roughly £17,000 loss all ended up in his wallet.
Investigators also found that Shinjin helped take around £8,000 from a third victim’s Coinbase account. A fourth victim lost approximately £130,000. Overall, the fraud took almost £200,000 worth of cryptocurrency, while Shinjin received more than £44,000.
Police said he used the money for luxury trips to Dubai, an expensive apartment in Canary Wharf and gold-plated dental grills. He was first arrested at his flat in 2021. He was arrested again at Heathrow Airport in October 2023 after returning from Dubai, following the discovery of additional evidence. Shinjin gave no comment during police interviews.
Detective Constable Simon Ardeman of the City of London Police said SIM-swap fraud was a sophisticated and increasingly concerning form of offending, adding that the case showed the serious consequences for victims.
SIM-swap cases rise in the UK
The case comes as unauthorized SIM-swap incidents become a more prominent fraud concern in the United Kingdom. Cifas, a fraud-prevention service, reported in August that cases recorded on the UK’s National Fraud Database increased 402% in the first half of 2026 compared with the same period a year earlier.
Cifas said SIM swaps were increasingly being used to intercept security codes and bypass protections on accounts. The underlying risk is not limited to cryptocurrency: any account that relies on a phone number for authentication may be exposed if criminals first gain control of that number.
Mark Birchall, a staff cybersecurity editor at Norton, recommends using an authentication app for two-factor authentication rather than text messages. An authentication app links the extra login step to a physical device instead of relying on access to a mobile number.
He also recommends setting a separate PIN or passcode with a mobile carrier where that option is available, and enabling account-takeover protection if offered. Such features can impose stricter verification requirements before changes are made to a mobile account.
Current crypto market picture
Moneyiar market data at approximately 11:08–11:09 a.m. on October 9, 2026, showed declines across the four tracked assets:
- NEAR Protocol (NEAR): $4.7511589137, down 7.44% over 24 hours and 2.40% over seven days.
- Injective (INJ): $6.9990679201, down 4.92% over 24 hours and 6.85% over seven days.
- Mina (MINA): $0.0785191195, down 7.27% over 24 hours and 51.47% over seven days.
- ONEchain (ONE): $0.1298235573, down 4.33% over 24 hours and 5.12% over seven days.
These market figures describe price movements and are separate from the criminal case. The prosecution concerns unauthorized access to victims’ accounts and the transfer of their cryptocurrency, rather than ordinary trading losses.
