Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev was convicted of money laundering by a Dutch court and sentenced to five years and four months in prison.
The conviction of cryptocurrency mixing protocol creator Tornado Cash’s creator, Alexey Pertsev, for money laundering, might have serious ramifications for others who create open-source software.
At s-Hertogenbosch court on May 14, Dutch judges found Pertsev guilty of money laundering. The developer was given a five-year, four-month prison sentence for using the site to illegally launder $1.2 billion in illicit assets.
Despite Tornado Cash being a non-custodial crypto mixing protocol, which means that the monies that flow through it are never retained or controlled by it, the sentence was imposed.
The developer was originally imprisoned in the Netherlands in August 2022, shortly after Tornado Cash was placed on the U.S. government’s blacklist, and was later found guilty despite having no control over the funds.
The legal team for Pertsev will have 14 days to file an appeal against the court decision.
