🗒I've Got a Blank Space, Baby, and I'll Write Your Name🖋
A Pittsburgh attorney who also served as president of a beloved historic incline's preservation nonprofit has been indicted — accused of draining over $1.3 million from the organization's accounts and funneling it into digital assets. And we have questions. Several.
Let's try to piece this together, because frankly, the facts alone are disorienting enough before you even get to the part where digital currency enters the picture.
Christopher Furman, 53, of Pittsburgh, was indicted by the Department of Justice on wire fraud and money laundering charges. He was president of the Board of Trustees for the Society for the Preservation of the Duquesne Heights Incline — yes, that historic trolley that's been hauling people up a steep hillside since 1870. The one that nearly vanished until neighborhood residents rescued and restored it in the 1960s. A community treasure. A non-profit. A labor of local love.
Furman was reportedly chosen for the board presidency due to his unique combination of qualifications: he was a former employee of the incline itself, he understood its mechanics, and he was a licensed attorney. Which, one would imagine, means he understood quite well what fiduciary duty means. Quite well. And yet.
Between October 2024 and September 2025, $1,379,300 was transferred out of the Society's bank accounts — and into Furman's own.
From there, the DOJ says that money was moved onto an online digital currency exchange and digital asset management platform, where Furman allegedly bought and sold digital assets for personal gain. Now, here is where the confusion really sets in for anyone who's spent time in the digital currency hobbyist space. Most of us are clicking faucets, stacking small amounts, watching volatility with the nervous energy of someone who checked their balance one too many times. And then there's apparently a parallel universe where someone just... dumps $1.3M in stolen nonprofit funds into digital assets like it's a personal investment portfolio?
The sheer audacity of the alleged scheme is hard to process. This wasn't a shadowy anonymous actor. This was a guy who presumably attended board meetings. Who signed documents? Who probably had opinions about cable maintenance schedules for a 155-year-old incline. And allegedly, between agenda items, he was transferring the incline's money to himself and trading digital assets with it.
Furman now faces 10 counts total. Each wire fraud count carries a potential maximum of 20 years and fines exceeding $250,000. Each money laundering count? Up to 10 years and additional fines beyond $250,000. The FBI led the investigation, and the case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Brendan J. McKenna.
For those of us in the digital currency world, the takeaway isn't that the asset class enables crime — it's that it was apparently legible enough to someone like this as a vehicle to move and trade money quickly. The blockchain doesn't forget. The DOJ doesn't either. And the Duquesne Heights Incline — still operating, still climbing that hill — will presumably outlast all of this, same as it always has.
We're just still a little confused about the whole thing, honestly.
