A U.S. Army master sergeant who helped plan and carry out the raid that captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has been arrested and charged with using classified information from the mission to win more than $400,000 on the prediction market Polymarket.
The Special Forces soldier, who has since been identified as Gannon Ken Van Dyke, serves at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. He is facing five charges stemming from alleged misuse of government secrets.
The charges are illegally using confidential government info for personal profit, stealing nonpublic government documents, commodities fraud, wire fraud, and an unlawful money transfer
Arrest of President Nicolás Maduro
An indictment unsealed on Thursday, April 23, in Manhattan federal court details how Van Dyke opened a Polymarket account in late December and placed a series of bets that Maduro would be out of power by the end of January.
He wagered about $32,000 on what looked like a long-shot outcome at the time.
Van Dyke allegedly made 13 separate bets between Dec. 27 and Jan. 2, just hours before the overnight raid. After President Donald Trump announced the successful capture on Jan. 3, the markets rallied in his favor. Van Dyke profited approximately $409,881.
Prosecutors say he then sent the winnings to a foreign cryptocurrency vault before moving the money into an online brokerage account.
U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton for the Southern District of New York said using state information for personal gain is a criminal offense.
“Those entrusted to safeguard our nation’s secrets have a duty to protect them and our armed service members, and not to use that information for personal financial gain,” Clayton said in a statement.
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Van Dyke took part in Operation Absolute Resolve, the Delta Force-led mission that seized Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, from a residence in Caracas in the predawn hours of Jan. 3.
U.S. special forces came under heavy fire during the operation but extracted the couple without any American deaths reported. Maduro was flown to New York to face federal drug-trafficking charges. He has pleaded not guilty.
Van Dyke signed nondisclosure agreements as part of his work and had access to classified details about the planning and timing of the raid starting around Dec. 8, according to the indictment.
The oversized bets caught the attention of law enforcement almost immediately. CNN reported last month that federal prosecutors were investigating the Maduro trades on Polymarket.
Officials from the securities and commodity fraud units in Manhattan met with representatives from the platform.
Van Dyke will make his first court appearance on Thursday in North Carolina. The case is assigned to U.S. District Judge Margaret M. Garnett in the Southern District of New York. No attorney has been listed for him on the court docket yet.
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The charges could bring decades in prison if he is convicted on all counts.
This marks the first time a member of the U.S. military involved in a major special operations mission has been charged with using classified details to profit on a prediction market.
Polymarket allows users to bet real money, typically in cryptocurrency, on the outcomes of news events, elections, and other real-world happenings. The platform has become very popular very quickly, but has been criticized for the danger of insider information being used.
Military officials have not commented publicly on the arrest, citing the active investigation.
Investigators are still examining whether anyone else had advance knowledge of the operation or profited from it. So far, Van Dyke is the only person charged.
The Justice Department, the FBI, and the Pentagon have all been involved in the probe.
Prosecutors say they will continue to pursue anyone who exploits sensitive military operations for personal profit.
