The court found Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev guilty of laundering $1.2 billion in illegal funds. The Dutch court sentenced 31-year-old Alexey Pertsev, who lives in the Netherlands, to 64 months in prison. Legal representatives of the Tornado Cash developer have 14 days to appeal the court’s decision. This news had a negative impact on the price of the relevant altcoin. Thus, TORN price started to fall.
The court found the developer of Tornado Cash guilty
The developer was first imprisoned in the Netherlands in August 2022, when Tornado Cash was banned by the US government. cryptokoin.comAs you follow from , the US Treasury claimed that Tornado Cash was a critical tool for the notorious North Korean hacking group Lazarus. During Pertsev’s trial in March, prosecutors said he didn’t do enough to stop criminals from using Tornado Cash.
However, the defense stated that prosecutors did not take into account that TornadoCash was open source and worked on automated smart contracts. Pertsev noted that Tornado Cash is anonymous and independent. Therefore, he argued that it was unfair to blame him for the actions of Tornado Cash users.
What does the conviction mean for the industry?
A similar sentiment was echoed by several industry commentators. Raphaël Bloch, co-founder of ‘The Big Whale’, also underlined this concern in his last tweet, in which he stated that it was dangerous for Pertsev to be found guilty of money laundering, and emphasized that Pertsev had only developed an open source tool. In this context, Bloch said:
Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev has been found guilty of money laundering by a Dutch court. This decision is very dangerous because Pertsev only developed an open source tool. Condemning it is like condemning a knife or a car manufacturer whose users misbehave.
Additionally, Tornado Cash is a non-custodial crypto mixing protocol. This means that it never holds or controls the funds transferred through the protocol.
‘A sad day for privacy and open source’
The outcome of this case could set a precedent for future cases involving other Tornado Cash developers. Two other developers of the crypto mixer, Roman Storm and Roman Semenov, are also accused of money laundering and violating sanctions in the United States.
Meanwhile, Storm’s trial will be in September. However, Semenov is not yet detained. Former NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden had previously publicly supported Storm’s request for support in her legal defense. Pablo Sabbatella, Head of Security Research at Blockfence, called it “a sad day for privacy, crypto and open source.”
Altcoin price has fallen
News of the conviction had a negative impact on the altcoin price. TORN price decreased from $2.90 at the beginning of the day to $2.72. At the time of writing, the token was changing hands at $2.75, losing 5.4% on a daily basis.
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