Kidnapper admits to beating, waterboarding ‘Crypto King’ Aiden Pleterski

Warning: This story contains distressing details about torture and graphic images

Self-proclaimed “Crypto King” Aiden Pleterski was on his knees begging for his life while his kidnapper pointed a gun at him and counted down from three. 

Before reaching one, the kidnapper fired the gun beside Pleterski’s head.

“Where is it?” Deren Akyeam-Pong demanded after taking the shot.

The exchange is part of a 13-second video taken the night of Pleterski’s 2022 kidnapping. It was entered as an exhibit during Akyeam-Pong’s guilty plea on nine related charges including kidnapping, assault and various gun charges last month in Ontario Superior Court in Toronto. 

Pleterski, now 26, thought he was meeting with a potential investor on Dec. 5, 2022, when a gun was pressed into his ribs in the backseat of a pickup truck in Toronto. The abduction was the beginning of a three-day long kidnapping during which Pleterski was threatened and tortured. The torture included waterboarding, cigarette burns and getting beaten with golf clubs as his captors drove him between several locations in southern Ontario.

These new details come from the agreed-upon statement of facts presented in Akyeam-Pong’s case. The court filing and video were previously subject to a temporary publication ban which Justice Linda Shin lifted Monday.

At the time of his kidnapping, Pleterski was a few months into a bankruptcy proceeding that his investors had forced him into, to try to recover more than $40 million they gave him to invest in cryptocurrency and foreign currencies.

Only about $3 million has since been recovered for roughly 160 investors through that proceeding, which also determined that Pleterski spent $16 million on himself.

The trials for two other men accused in the kidnapping — Akil Heywood and Alfredo Paladino — were set to begin last month, but following Akyeam-Pong’s guilty plea, their lawyers requested an adjournment, which was granted. A trial for the third accused, Rakeem Henry, is set for January.

Heywood had invested hundreds of thousands of dollars with Pleterski. Heywood orchestrated the kidnapping to try to recover the money he thought he was owed, according to the agreed statement of facts in Akyeam-Pong’s case. He offered to pay Akyeam-Pong, Paladino and Henry to carry out the kidnapping. 

The kidnapping-related charges against Heywood, Paladino and Henry have yet to be tested in court. Their inclusion in this story, and alleged involvement in the kidnapping, is based on the agreed statement of facts from Akyeam-Pong’s guilty plea. Heywood previously told CBC Toronto he is innocent.

A few days before Pleterski’s abduction, Akyeam-Pong posed as a crypto investor called “Slime Dawg Millionaire” and met him at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in downtown Toronto to gain his trust, according to the agreed statement of facts. Henry also attended the meeting.

On Dec. 5, a second meeting was set up with Pleterski under the premise of wanting more information about cryptocurrency.