A Dutch judge determined on Wednesday that Alexey Pertsev, who is accused of assisting money laundering through the now-approved Tornado Cash app, must remain in prison for at least an additional 90 days.
Just two days after the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned the currency mixing service, which it connected to over $1 billion in nefarious transactions and to North Korean hackers, Pertsev, 29, was detained on the Dutch authorities’ orders on August 10.
The arrest has alarmed the Web3 community, which has warned that it could have a chilling effect on individuals who are working on open-source software as well as those who have good cause to employ mixers, which protect the privacy of crypto transactions.
Initially hauled before an examining judge on August 12 – Tornado Cash Dev
Pertsev, who is based in Amsterdam, was given a two-week initial detention sentence.
Pertsev’s attorneys requested that he be granted bail during a hearing held Wednesday in Den Bosch, the Netherlands, behind closed doors. The judge denied that motion, but the court nevertheless established a 90-day deadline for the initial public hearing. Pertsev is still not formally facing any criminal charges.
The decentralized Tornado Cash service does little to examine whether funds are of unlawful origin, according to FIOD, the Dutch agency in charge of looking into financial crime, which is why it launched its investigation into Tornado Cash in June. Campaigners claim the arrest poses a threat to the survival of open-source software since it would essentially hold creators accountable for how their code is used in the future.
Congressman Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) of the United States has also questioned Treasury’s Office of Foreign Asset Control’s decision to blacklist software rather than the persons or organizations that are typically the subject of sanctions.
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