What does a party-appointed expert do in a crypto case?

Party expert and court-appointed expert

Legal systems organise expert evidence in two broad ways. In many civil law countries the court or prosecutor appoints an official expert, and the parties may appoint their own experts to follow that work, propose questions and file observations. In Italy, for example, this is the consulente tecnico di parte (CTP), who can attend the court expert's operations and the prosecutor's technical tests that cannot be repeated. In common law systems the parties usually instruct their own experts, who give evidence and can be cross-examined, while owing their main duty to the court. International arbitration often combines both, with party experts and sometimes a tribunal-appointed expert.

What the party expert does in practice

• Reviews the seizure records, wallet addresses and exchange responses in the case file.
• Re-runs the tracing independently on blockchain data and checks every transaction cited.
• Identifies weak attributions, unsupported links between wallets and people, and calculation errors.
• Proposes questions for the court's expert or for cross-examination, and attends technical operations where allowed.
• Files a report or written observations, and may be heard at the hearing.

For victims and for defendants

For a victim of theft or fraud, the party expert can trace where the stolen funds went, identify exchanges that may hold them and support requests for freezing or seizure. For a defendant, the expert verifies whether the funds attributed to the client really came from the alleged offence, whether the amounts are correct and whether the link between the client and the wallets is proven. In both roles the value of the work lies in rigour, not advocacy: a party report that overstates its conclusions loses credibility with the court.

Why early involvement matters

Deadlines in criminal and insolvency proceedings are often short, some technical operations happen only once, and crypto can be moved within minutes. Appointing a party expert as soon as the case file or the seizure records are available allows the party to attend key operations and raise objections at the right moment rather than after the fact.

How Advisorn helps

The managing partner of Advisorn, a specialist in crypto and anti-money laundering, acts as party-appointed technical consultant in Italian criminal proceedings involving crypto assets. Advisorn Forensics also prepares party expert reports for proceedings in other countries, working with the party's lawyer and not replacing them.