In early January 2024, Ari Ben Swartz, a retired systems analyst living in Las Cruces, New Mexico, did what many newly single Americans do: he downloaded Tinder. His wife had passed away, and the app offered some companionship, even if only digital. He soon matched with a woman who went by Nomi Erokhina and suggested moving their chat to WhatsApp.
What began as a flirtatious conversation soon turned into a financial horror story. In a Missouri state court complaint, Swartz recounted how Erokhina and a mysterious crypto platform called Web3z.cc apparently orchestrated what he alleged was a textbook example of what the digital asset industry calls a “pig butchering” scam—totaling nearly $3 million.