The Attorney General's Office Socializes Handling Crypto Assets As Evidence Of Criminal Cases

The Attorney General's Office (AGO) team socialized to the prosecutors of the High Prosecutor's Office, South Sulawesi, the Attorney General's guidelines Number 7 of 2023 concerning Handling Crypto Assets as Evidence in Criminal Cases.

"This guideline is intended as a reference for prosecutors and officials who organize the governance of confiscated objects, evidence, and confiscated goods in handling crypto assets at the investigation stage, pre-prosecution, prosecution, examination at trial, and implementation of court decisions," said Deputy Attorney General for General Crimes Fadil Zumhana in Makassar as reported by ANTARA, Thursday, November 2.

He said the Attorney General's Guideline number 7 of 2023 concerning the handling of Crypto assets as evidence in criminal cases is a novelty or novelty in handling cases so that the common perception in handling crypto assets is realized in criminal cases.

Head of the Legal and Foreign Relations Bureau of Bernadeta Maria Elastiyani as the maker of the prosecutor's change project and as a source in the socialization said that crypto assets are evidence that has very vulnerable properties, fluctuating values, and are easily changed and transferred.

Therefore, he said, the handling must be carried out quickly and appropriately. Handling crypto assets must fulfill an 'exclusionary of rule principle' which requires obtaining evidence in legally based ways so that crypto assets become legal evidence to be used in proving criminal cases.

Maria explained the purpose of implementing this socialization as a reference for prosecutors and officials who organize the governance of confiscated objects, evidence, and confiscated goods in handling crypto assets at the stage of investigation, pre-prosecution, prosecution, examination at trial, and implementation of court decisions.

"Meanwhile, the purpose of this socialization is as a guideline aimed at regulating and equating perceptions of handling crypto assets in criminal cases," he explained.

Head of the South Sulawesi High Prosecutor's Office, Leonard Eben Ezer Simanjuntak, said that currently, the use and massive use of crypto asset transactions are being carried out both in Indonesia and around the world, and along with these developments, there is the potential for an increasing modus operandi of criminal acts using crypto assets.

Therefore, crypto assets are evidence that has very vulnerable properties, fluctuating values, and is easily changed and transferred. So that the handling must be carried out quickly and appropriately both at the stage of investigation, prosecution, examination at trial, and the implementation of court decisions.

However, in the practice of handling criminal acts that use crypto assets, he said, there is no legal instrument that specifically regulates the procedures for handling crypto assets in criminal cases, resulting in different handling practices or disparities.