The Pastor Who Allegedly Scammed His Flock With Cryptocurrency Because "God Told Him To Do It" Has Officially Been Indicted On 40 Counts Of Theft, Securities Fraud, And Racketeering

The Independent – A Denver pastor and his wife have been accused of running a cryptocurrency scam and using the proceeds to pay for a home renovation and vacations.

Eligio “Eli” Regalado and Kaitlyn Regalado were indicted on 40 counts of theft, securities fraud and racketeering, the Denver District Attorney’s Office said last week. Prosecutors say the Regalados solicited $3.4 million from investors looking to buy their cryptocurrency, INDXCoin, but only a “small amount of the proceeds went to the business venture.”

Instead, the Regalados are accused of spending at least $1.3 million of those proceeds on personal expenses, including a home renovation that they said “the Lord” told them to do, prosecutors said. The couple is also accused of spending it on airline tickets, motel rooms and high-end retail merchandise, among other personal expenses.

The cryptocurrency has “zero value” and “all of the investors lost all of their money,” prosecutors said.

I had totally forgotten about this beautiful, God-fearing Colorado couple. Karim wrote the blog when it first came to light in January 2024. When the video first went viral, the Regalado family was merely facing civil charges from the Colorado Securities & Exchange Commission. 

This guy rules. I mean... he fucking sucks. He rules in a "this guy is so committed to being a lying piece of shit I have to tip my cap" type of way. The part of that video that resonated with everyone was the, "The Lord told us to start a cryptocurrency" part. But specifically, I liked when Pastor Regalado and The Lord got deeper into the weeds of their conversation, and got to discussing liquidity.  

Eli Regalado (speaking to The Lord): Where is this liquidity going to come from?

The Lord: Trust me

Then he goes on to say how him and his wife were "tithing and sewing" (i.e. collecting money under false pretenses and immediately spending it on themselves). They were confident God would continue to bless them with endless "investments". They were basically relying on God to fund a Ponzi scheme that stood the test of time. Except this particular scam seems to be even less "legitimate" that Ponzi scheme, because they didn't even pretend to give their investors an out.

I'm pretty confident in saying there's a 99.99% chance this pastor was, and still is completely full of shit. That he has zero problem exploiting people's faith and lying on God's name. But there's a small part of me that wonders if he mistakenly took a double dose of Ambien one night (or a bathtub's worth of LSD) and had a wild dream (or hallucination) in which him and God discussed giving his congregation a "10x", and spending $200,000 of their money on a home remodel. That Pastor Regalado was truly crazy enough... that he had that much faith in God... and was so incredibly narcissistic that he believed God would come to him with a too good to be true infinite money glitch. But even as his whole world crumbled around him, him and his wife remained confident that any day now, God would "do a miracle" (Pastor Regalado's words) and they'd walk away from this scot-free.  

Well it's been about 18 months since those first charges came to light, and it appears God still hasn't gotten around to doing that miracle. Maybe it's still coming. That's the thing about God. He works in mysterious ways. But as of now, Denver's District Attorney is hitting the pastor and his wife with 40 counts of theft, securities fraud, and racketeering. 

Note: This gives Donald Trump the opportunity to do the funniest thing ever. He could pardon the Regalado's. Claim that God came to him and said, "Trust me, this is part of my plan". Pastor Regalado and his wife would go home free. It would solidify their belief in the The Lord. Prove the existence of God to his flock. Trump could lay claim to being the first ever U.S. President who was used as a vessel by God to carry out a miracle. His first ever cryptocurrency miracle.

I suppose for many people, the rise of cryptocurrency was a miracle from God in its own right. But if God is going to bless anybody with a second cryptocurrency miracle, how about visiting some people in their dreams and letting them know how to unlock the protected USB drive they stored 10 Bitcoins on in 2016. The people who have one more attempt to guess the right password to access their millions of dollars, or else the USB drive will spontaneously combust. Those are the people who need a cryptocurrency miracle. Not this scamming Colorado couple who trying to exploit Christianity for a living.