Shocking Heist: $17M in XRP Vanishes From Widow of Country Icon George Jones
Crypto crime hits close to home—$17 million in XRP reportedly siphoned from Nancy Jones' digital vault. The widow of country legend George Jones becomes the latest victim in an unrelenting wave of high-profile crypto thefts.
How the heist unfolded remains murky, but the damage is crystal clear: another brutal reminder that decentralized finance still plays by Wild West rules. No FDIC insurance here—just cold, hard blockchain receipts and a trail gone cold.
The irony? This theft could've bought 17 million copies of George's classic 'He Stopped Loving Her Today.' But in crypto land, love—and security—don't come guaranteed.
Kirk West was arrested Friday on criminal theft charges. Courtesy: Franklin Police Department
Per a restraining order Jones WOULD later file against West, the two became romantically involved weeks after Jones allowed West to become her roommate. Jones claimed she wholly funded West’s lifestyle from then on, taking him on vacations and buying him luxury vehicles.
Jones would later assert that West was not wealthy or successful, as he had initially claimed to be, but was instead “penniless.”
In 2016, West pled guilty to two counts of criminal bank fraud, and was placed under house arrest at Jones’ home. It was during this period that, per Jones, West became a self-proclaimed “crypto expert,” and persuaded the widow to buy up large positions in multiple cryptocurrencies including XRP, Ethereum (ETH), Dogecoin (DOGE), shiba inu (SHIB), and Stellar (XLM), another token created by one of Ripple’s founders.
Just weeks ago, West allegedly broke into two safes in Jones’ home and stole, among other items, a Ledger wallet containing 5,534,307 XRP tokens. Two days later, Jones booted West out of her house. On Friday, local police arrested West on a criminal theft charge at the Nashville International Airport, the Franklin Police Department confirmed with Decrypt.
Jones and her attorneys were reportedly able to recover most of the allegedly stolen XRP, but have not been able to track down roughly 483,000 of the tokens.
The timing of the saga is apt, in some ways: XRP has flown to all-time highs in recent weeks, after years of flagging fortunes. Back in 2016, when West and Jones first invested in the cryptocurrency, it was worth roughly half a cent. Earlier this month, the token exploded to $3.65, a new record.
The sum of XRP tokens allegedly held in Nancy Jones’ SAFE and later stolen by West would have been worth about $35,000 in 2016. At writing, it’s now worth more than $17.4 million.
