Tornado Cash Developer Alexey Pertsev denied bail by Dutch Court

The developer of Tornado Cash, Alexey Pertsev, was ordered to stay behind bars today by a Dutch court while he gets ready to file an appeal against his money laundering conviction. Pertsev claimed he is not a flight risk, but a Dutch Court of Appeal in's-Hertogenbosch rejected his bail request and upheld the decision to keep him in custody. 

After being found guilty of laundering $2.2 billion, Pertsev has spent the last two months in detention. Pertsev was not allowed to use a computer or the internet while he was being held. His attorneys, Judith de Boer and Keith Cheng, argued that in order for him to prepare his defense, he needed access to a computer and the internet. However, these requests have been turned down by the court and prison administration due to security concerns. 

The case involves complex DeFi technical elements centered on smart contracts, relayers, and protocol governance, and Pertsev's attorneys said it was very important to have his technical expertise in these areas. 

Shortly after Tornado Cash was sanctioned by the US Treasury, Pertsev was taken into custody in August 2022. The case, according to critics, creates a risky precedent for open-source developers, who may now worry about facing legal consequences depending on how their software is used. 

The 31-year-old Russian national was sentenced to 64 months in prison, or over five years, by a three-judge Dutch court on May 14 for using the Tornado Cash cryptocurrency mixer to launder $2.2 billion in stolen and compromised cryptocurrency. Prosecutors claimed Pertsev could have prevented criminal entities from using the platform, including Lazarus, a North Korean cybercrime group. 

The three-judge Dutch panel agreed with the prosecution, ruling that Tornado Cash was intentionally created to be used for illicit purposes. Another judge made the observation that people are still subject to the law even if they follow a particular technological ideology. The attorneys representing Pertsev stated that the right to a fair trial is guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights, which is violated by his prolonged detention.

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