This is a segment from the Empire newsletter. To read full editions, subscribe.

This is not a happy story. But I can’t get it out of my head.

Earlier this month, it was reported that 21-year-old Alabama resident Berman Nowlin — convicted of wire fraud and money laundering charges over an NFT rug pull in 2022 — had died by suicide.

A district court in Florida had ruled him guilty only three weeks earlier. He was due for sentencing later in January and faced a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

The rug pull in question referred to a short-lived Bored Apes-inspired project Undead Apes Society, which included three NFT collections released over two…

Read more on Blockworks