Blockchain Association CEO arrested in Costa Rica is back home
Blockchain Association CEO Kristin Smith posted on Twitter earlier this week that she had been detained in Costa Rica and not allowed to leave the country.
“I’m being arrested at the Liberia airport in Costa Rica,” Smith tweeted on Wednesday. “We are told that we cannot leave until tomorrow and have to sleep here at the airport.”
Smith tweeted Thursday that she was released to the main area of the airport under the supervision of immigration agents after spending Wednesday night in a detention center. This is confirmed by the Blockchain Association Decrypt Thursday night that Smith was cleared to return to the United States and was in fact on his way home.
“Kristin is grateful to all those who offered support, along with Blockchain Association members, friends and colleagues, for their well wishes and support during this time,” said Blockchain Association Executive Vice President of Marketing and Communications Curtis Kincaid Decrypt in an email.
Before he was released, Smith said the shocking incident in the Central American nation happened after vacationing at the Hacienda AltaGracia, Auberge Resort.
“On Wednesday, April 12, Kristin was taken into custody for a missing passport stamp,” Kincaid said.
“The authorities here are telling us that our passports are missing an entry stamp,” Smith tweeted on Thursday. “Apparently this is a very important stamp and it’s very bad if you don’t have one.”
Smith thanked US representatives Tom Emmer and Ro Khanna in a follow-up chirping for their assistance in contacting the US Embassy in Costa Rica for assistance.
The Blockchain Association did not provide further details about the missing stamp, or what was being done to facilitate Smith’s release to return home.
Launched in 2018, the Blockchain Association is a crypto lobby group consisting of nearly 100 members. Crypto companies supporting the association include Kraken, Uniswap, Digital Currency Group (DCG), Consensys and the Filecoin Foundation.
On Wednesday, the group had signaled its support for the plaintiffs in a lawsuit filed against the US Treasury Department over the department’s sanctions against Tornado Cash, an Ethereum privacy service. The Blockchain Association filed an amicus brief, a document filed with a court by someone with an interest in a legal case but not a party to the case.
“We urge OFAC to see Tornado Cash for what it is: an autonomous, decentralized software program that supports the right to privacy, rather than a tool that is de facto illegal simply because it can be used by anyone, including bad actors,” Smith said in a statement at the time.
