FORT BRAGG, NORTH CAROLINA — Gannon Ken Van Dyke, a master sergeant at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, is due to be arraigned in a New York federal courthouse on Tuesday on charges that he used classified information to place bets on a covert military operation to seize Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Prosecutors allege Van Dyke helped plan and execute the operation while trading on the Polymarket betting platform using his knowledge of top-secret operations.

Van Dyke faces charges of unlawful use of confidential government information for personal gain, theft of non-public government information, commodities fraud, wire fraud, and making an unlawful monetary transaction. In a separate lawsuit brought by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, he is accused of insider trading.

Van Dyke has been an active duty soldier in the U.S. Army since 2008 and has served as a master sergeant with the U.S. Army Special Forces since 2023. At Fort Bragg, he was trained for special operations and signed non-disclosure agreements to deal with classified operations. In September 2018, he signed a non-disclosure agreement acknowledging the U.S. government placed "special confidence and trust" in him and that he would never divulge anything marked as "sensitive" information or that he knew such information.

Van Dyke created his Polymarket account on 26 December 2025 using a virtual private network service that showed him browsing in a foreign country, and used a personal email address to set it up. Between 27 December and 2 January, he purchased about $33,934 worth of bets related to Maduro and Venezuela, predicting when U.S. forces would enter Venezuela and when Maduro would be unseated.

On 3 January, U.S. President Donald Trump announced the overnight capture of Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in Caracas. Van Dyke cashed out more than $400,000 after betting on Maduro's removal.

According to the Department of Justice, he withdrew about $409,881 in winnings and transferred the bulk of the funds to a foreign cryptocurrency "vault" that generates interest. After news reports appeared about the bet, he took steps to conceal his identity and delete his Polymarket account, and changed the email address on his cryptocurrency exchange account to a new one he had created. On 16 January, he transferred the funds and their accumulated interest, approximately $444,209, to a newly created brokerage account. Investigators say they uncovered the history of his alleged betting despite his efforts to conceal his identity.

Van Dyke set up a property company and bought at least six homes. He made his most recent home purchase, a $340,000 three-bedroom, 2,400-square-foot home, 20 days after Maduro's capture. On a real estate investment forum, he wrote: "I currently own 5 properties, but am looking to pick up another 2-3 this year, so scalability is important for me."

"So it is the Wild West, because for most of the participants on Polymarket, we just don't know who they are. All we have is a blockchain address," said Joshua Mitts, a Professor of Law at Columbia Law School, describing the crypto-powered betting platform.