Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores are seen in handcuffs after landing at a Manhattan helipad, escorted by heavily armed federal agents, as they sit in an armored car on their way to a federal courthouse in Manhattan on January 5, 2026 in New York City.
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A US Army soldier was arrested in federal indictments accusing him of winning $400,000 by using classified information to bet on the Polymarket prediction market related to the US military mission to capture Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro. Department of Justice Said on Thursday.
Constable, gannon ken van dyke“Participated in the planning and implementation of the operation to capture Maduro,” the DOJ said.
The arrest comes as Polymarket and Kalshi have grown in popularity and concerns have grown about people with insider information betting on those prediction market platforms.
Van Dyke, 38, is expected to be arraigned before a magistrate judge in federal court for the Eastern District of North Carolina on Thursday evening.
The Fayetteville, North Carolina resident has been charged with three counts of violating the Commodity Exchange Act; one count of wire fraud; and one count of unlawful monetary transactions. He faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison if convicted of wire fraud, the top felony count, and up to 10 years on each of the remaining counts.
Commodity Futures Trading Commissionwho controls the prediction markets, Van Dyke was separately accused in a civil complaint. For allegedly using classified non-public information to make bets related to the Maduro capture mission.
Both criminal and civil cases against Van Dyke were filed in New York City, in the U.S. District Court in Manhattan.
When President Donald Trump was asked about Van Dyke’s arrest and other cases of suspected insider trading on prediction markets, he said, “You know the whole world, unfortunately, has become a casino to some extent.”
“And you look at what’s going on around the world, in Europe and everywhere else, they’re doing speculative things,” Trump said. “I was never in favor of it. Ideologically I don’t like it, but it is just the way it is… I’m not happy with any of this stuff.”
Trump’s son, donald trump jr“PolyMarkets has both an investor and an unpaid advisor, and Kalshi, a paid advisor at two of the largest prediction markets,” The New York Times said in a report in January.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanch said in a statement on Van Dyke’s arrest, “Our men and women in uniform are trusted with classified information to carry out their missions as safely and effectively as possible, and are prohibited from using this highly sensitive information for personal financial gain.”
“Widespread access to prediction markets is a relatively new phenomenon, but federal laws protecting national security information fully apply,” said Blanch.
CNBC has requested comment from Polymarket about the matter.
