Defense lawyer claims dozens of officials ignored bitcoin donation warning

Radek Šmerda, counsel for ex-deputy minister of justice Radomír Daňhel, contends that a cohort of roughly twenty-to-thirty officials from the Ministry of Finance, the Financial Analytical Office and the Office for State Representation in Property Matters possessed the same data on the state’s bitcoin donation and did not trigger a criminal report as required by law. He criticises the prosecution’s request for forensic assessments that were not yet prepared when the indictment was submitted, and points to a lag in investigative actions, noting that police only began proceedings against Daňhel in late January 2026, while related actions against the donor began months earlier. Šmerda also challenges the narrative that the Ministry of Justice knew the bitcoins were linked to the Nucleus darknet market before the gift, citing internal communications that suggest the risk was only identified after the donor tried to exchange the coins in Prague. Additionally, he claims the Office for State Representation voluntarily handed over a state wallet and that senior prosecutors sought to use the proceeds for equipment, contradicting assertions of early awareness of illicit origins.