A former Los Angeles Police Department officer was convicted of kidnapping a teenager in connection with a cryptocurrency robbery.

PANews reported on March 3 that, according to The Block, a Los Angeles County Superior Court jury found former Los Angeles Police Department officer Eric Halem guilty of kidnapping and robbery in a 2024 home invasion, convicting him of stealing $350,000 worth of Bitcoin from a 17-year-old. After a two-week trial, prosecutors accused Halem and three other men of impersonating police officers to enter the victim's high-rise apartment in Koreatown, threatening to kill him and forcing him to hand over a hard drive containing Bitcoin. Halem's defense attorney stated in closing that the victim admitted in the witness stand that his cryptocurrency wealth was obtained through fraud, but this did not change the robbery charge. Halem served 13 years with the LAPD, retiring in 2022, and was still a reserve officer at the time of the incident. He will be sentenced on March 31; the other defendants in the case have not yet been tried.