Crypto Investor Charged With Kidnapping and Torturing Man for Weeks

A 37-year-old cryptocurrency investor was charged on Saturday with kidnapping a man and beating, shocking and torturing him for weeks inside a luxury townhouse in downtown Manhattan, all in a scheme to get the man’s Bitcoin password, the authorities said.
The crypto investor, John Woeltz, was taken into custody on Friday after the man managed to escape the townhouse and notify the police. Mr. Woeltz was arraigned on Saturday morning in Manhattan criminal court and charged with assault, kidnapping, unlawful imprisonment and criminal possession of a gun. He was ordered held without bail and forced to surrender his passport, the Manhattan district attorney’s office said.
Another person, Beatrice Folchi, was also arrested on Friday and charged with kidnapping and unlawful imprisonment, though her connection to Mr. Woeltz was not immediately clear. A third person, identified only as an “unapprehended male,” was also mentioned as a participant in the abuse during Mr. Woeltz’s arraignment.
Wayne Ervin Gosnell Jr., Mr. Woeltz’s lawyer, declined to comment on Saturday.
Many details of the violent, weekslong episode remained murky on Saturday, including how Mr. Woeltz and the man knew each other and what had brought them to New York City.