Evidence & Legal

50 notes

Preserving evidence, chain of custody, admissibility, and defensible reporting.

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Concepts

Note
Blockchain as Evidence Custody Infrastructure
Glass Box Attribution
Post-Hack Appreciation and the Valuation Date
Working with Law Enforcement: Capacity, Speed, and Cross-Sector Coalitions

Principles

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A Self-Custodied Wallet Cannot Be Frozen, Only Moved
Describe Laundering in Phases When the Transactions Cannot Be Counted
Fact Witness vs Expert Witness
Handover Reports Must Be Replicable
Preserve Before You Attribute
Separate On-Chain Fact from Analytical Inference

Frameworks

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Admissibility: The Three Gates
Compelling VASP Disclosure: The Legal-Process Ladder
Court-Tested Attribution Evidence Types
Five Evidence Preservation Principles
Four Parallel Recovery Avenues
Partner Routing: What Each Recipient Actually Needs
Post-Seizure Custody and Disposal of Seized Crypto
Six Characteristics of a Court-Credible Forensic Report
The Analysis Standard: Four-Block Write-Up
The Compliance Referral Report Structure
The FinCEN SAR Narrative Structure
The Forfeiture-Complaint Tracing Narrative (DOJ Civil Forfeiture Structure)
The Three Layers of Blockchain Evidence

Workflows

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Evidence Preservation Procedure
Seizing Crypto: Devices, VASP Accounts, and the Agency Wallet

Tactics

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Anchor Every Finding With a Temporal Qualifier
Articulating No Legitimate Economic Purpose
Calibrate Your Testimony Language
Rewrite a Finding Into Calibrated Report Language

Checklists

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Chain of Custody by Evidence Type
Crypto Artifacts on a Seized Device
Custody Log: The Six Questions
Evidence Preservation Checklist
Identifying Cryptocurrency in the Field
Known Weaknesses to Disclose in a Forensic Report
Preparing and Executing a Crypto Seizure Transfer
Preserve the Analysis, Not Just the Finding
Reviewing an Opposing Forensic Report
The Exchange Request Package: What You Send
Three Conversations With the Prosecutor Before You Draft
VASP Records: What to Request and What Exists
What to Collect: On-Chain & Off-Chain Evidence

Cautions

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Commercial Analytics & the Daubert Challenge
Lawful Collection: Pretexting Poisons the Evidence
The Risk of Public Attribution
Time-Decay of Crypto Evidence

Worked examples

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D’Aloia v Persons Unknown: When the Methodology Fails, Not the Trace

Reference

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Expert Evidence Rules: USA, UK, Australia
Forensic Standards and Legal Instruments for Crypto Cases
Recovery Jurisdictions and Crypto Case Law

Last updated on September 23, 2026

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