Card arrested after a P2P crypto sale: how to lift the arrest in a criminal case

You sold cryptocurrency through P2P on an exchange, and later the bank told you your card had been arrested in a criminal case. This happens a lot. The buyer may have paid with stolen money, and the seller's card becomes "material evidence" for the investigators. The arrest (freezing) of property can be lifted on the owner's motion if the owner proves that the need for the arrest has gone or that it was imposed without justification (Part 1 of Article 174 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine, the CPC). A person with no status in the case can file this motion too. In a case where I represented exactly such an owner, the client's card was arrested in proceedings about the theft of funds through a remote banking system, and for ten months he could not use his own money. We proved the funds were lawful with statements from the bank and from the Binance crypto exchange, and on 22.10.2026 the Lychakivskyi District Court of Lviv lifted the arrest. Below: where to file the motion, which evidence convinced the court, and what to do if your card has been blocked.

In short: 6 key points

• Arrest of property in a criminal case is a temporary ban on disposing of or using property, imposed by an investigating judge or a court (Part 1 of Article 170 of the CPC). It stays in force until it is lifted.
• A motion to lift the arrest can be filed not only by a suspect or an accused, but also by any other owner or holder of the property who was not present when the arrest was considered (Part 1 of Article 174 of the CPC).
• During the pre-trial investigation the motion is considered by the investigating judge. After the indictment is sent to court, it is considered by the court hearing the case.
• There are two grounds for lifting the arrest: the need for it has gone, or it was imposed without justification. The owner must prove this.
• In case No. 463/3759/26 the decisive points were the statements from the bank and from the crypto exchange showing the lawful origin of the funds, and the prosecutor's position: the checks were done and there are no signs that the money was stolen.
• The court held that a ten-month arrest of the funds of a person with no procedural status was a disproportionate interference with the right to property, referred to the case law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), and lifted the arrest. The ruling cannot be appealed.

What arrest of property in a criminal case means

Arrest of property is a temporary deprivation, until it is lifted under the procedure set by the CPC, of the right to sell, dispose of and/or use property, imposed by a ruling of an investigating judge or a court. This is the definition in Part 1 of Article 170 of the CPC. It is imposed if there are grounds to believe that the property is evidence of a crime, is subject to special confiscation or confiscation, or is needed to secure a civil claim.

For money on a card it looks like this: the investigating judge bans disposal of the funds and suspends all debit operations on the account. The card formally works and the money is visible in the app, but it cannot be spent. This is exactly the ruling the investigating judge made on 01.12.2025 in our case, concerning my client's card and the account of another owner.

One important detail: the arrest is imposed on property, not on a person. So it also hits people who have nothing to do with the crime: a seller who received payment, the recipient of a transfer, a person to whose card the offenders sent money. In that case the arrest does not mean suspicion. It means that the investigation considers these funds possible evidence.

Why cards of P2P sellers on crypto exchanges get arrested

The scheme that puts ordinary crypto sellers' cards under arrest is simple. A fraudster gains access to someone else's bank account or tricks a victim into sending money, then cashes it out through a P2P deal: he buys cryptocurrency from a seller on an exchange and pays by transfer from the stolen account. The seller sees an ordinary payment and releases the crypto, and later the victim goes to the police.

The investigators follow the money: they identify the accounts that received the stolen funds and ask the investigating judge to arrest them. That is how the seller's card becomes possible material evidence, even though the seller may know neither the fraudster nor the victim. So the defence in such cases rests on proving two things: the payment was for a lawful deal, and the recipient had nothing to do with the crime.

In case No. 463/3759/26 the proceedings concerned exactly the theft of funds through a remote banking system, and the lawfulness of the money on my client's card was confirmed by statements from the bank and from the Binance crypto exchange.

Who can file a motion to lift the arrest of property

The list of applicants is in Part 1 of Article 174 of the CPC: a suspect, an accused, their defence lawyer, a legal representative, any other owner or holder of the property, a representative of a legal entity against which proceedings are conducted, if they were not present when the arrest was considered.

That last condition matters. Card owners are usually not notified when the investigator's motion is considered: the arrest is imposed without them, and they learn about it when the bank refuses an operation. This is why the law lets them come to court later and ask for the arrest to be lifted.

In our case there were two applicants: my client, a private individual, and a sole proprietor with his or her own lawyer. As the prosecutor confirmed at the hearing, neither had any procedural status in the criminal case.

Where to file: the investigating judge or the court

It depends on the stage of the proceedings.

In case No. 463/3759/26 the arrest was imposed by an investigating judge, but when the motion was filed, the indictment was already in the Lychakivskyi District Court of Lviv. So the motion was considered by the court hearing the case itself, and it did so within special court proceedings (in absentia), which are held against an accused without his participation. This did not affect the card owner: the question of the arrest of his property is a separate question within the same case.

Two grounds for lifting the arrest

Paragraph 2 of Part 1 of Article 174 of the CPC names two grounds. The applicant must prove at least one.

• The need has gone. The arrest was justified at the start of the investigation, but now its purpose has been achieved or cannot be achieved: all investigative actions with the property are done, the expert examination is finished, the link between the funds and the crime has not been confirmed.
• The arrest was imposed without justification. There were no grounds from the start: the property does not meet the features of material evidence, is not subject to confiscation, and the investigating judge did not take into account the reasonableness and proportionality of the restriction.

The court assesses the motion by the same criteria as when the arrest is imposed: Part 2 of Article 173 of the CPC requires it to take into account the legal ground for the arrest, whether the property can be used as evidence, the reasonableness and proportionality of the restriction of the right to property to the aims of the proceedings, and the consequences of the arrest for third parties. And Part 3 of Article 132 of the CPC puts the burden directly on the prosecutor: security measures are not allowed unless the prosecutor proves that the needs of the investigation justify such a degree of interference.

In practice this means: the applicant shows that the funds are lawful and that the arrest drags on without need, and the prosecutor has to explain why the arrest is still necessary. If the prosecutor cannot explain, the balance tips towards the owner.

Case No. 463/3759/26: a third party's card in proceedings about stolen funds

The criminal proceedings concerned the theft of funds through unauthorised interference with a remote banking system, classified under Part 5 of Article 185, Part 3 of Article 209 and Part 5 of Article 361 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. During the investigation, the investigators identified the accounts that received the funds and asked for them to be arrested as material evidence.

That is how my client's card came under arrest. The investigating judge's reasoning was standard: the funds on the card were obtained through an unlawful act and matter for establishing the circumstances of the proceedings.

Neither the client nor I went to the hearing: we asked for the motion to be considered without us. The prosecutor, the representative of the victims and the defence lawyer of the accused did not object to lifting the arrest.

Which evidence convinced the court

There were three key arguments, and each closed a separate question.

1. Lawful origin of the funds. We submitted statements from JSC CB PrivatBank and from the cryptocurrency exchange service Binance. They showed where the money came from. The court referred to Part 2 of Article 328 of the Civil Code of Ukraine: the right of ownership is presumed to be acquired lawfully unless a court has found the acquisition unlawful.
2. No procedural status. The client was neither a suspect nor an accused. The prosecutor confirmed that the prosecution had not obtained evidence that the funds on the applicants' accounts were stolen.
3. Investigative actions are complete. The prosecutor confirmed that all necessary investigative and procedural actions had been carried out with the arrested accounts, and their results did not confirm any unauthorised interference. There was no longer a need to keep the property as evidence.

If your card was arrested after you sold cryptocurrency through P2P, the main evidence is the full history of the deal: the order on the exchange, the correspondence with the buyer, the statement showing the money received, and the cryptocurrency transfer. Save it at once, while the account is still accessible. Statements obtained months later are sometimes incomplete.

The court also noted separately that the funds on the applicants' accounts are not subject to special confiscation and are not property that can be used to compensate for damage. So none of the possible purposes of an arrest under Article 170 of the CPC applied to them.

Why ten months of arrest is disproportionate

An arrest is a temporary measure, and the court pointed this out directly: at the time of the hearing the arrest had lasted ten months. In that time the investigation had managed to carry out all the necessary actions, and no new circumstances had appeared to show that the funds mattered for the prosecution.

The court assessed the situation under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and referred to the case law of the European Court of Human Rights:

• "Sporrong and Lönnroth v. Sweden" (1982) and "East/West Alliance Limited v. Ukraine" (application No. 19336/04, 2014) — an interference with the right to property must strike a fair balance, and the balance is upset if a person bears an individual and excessive burden;
• "Akshin Garayev v. Azerbaijan" (application No. 30352/11, 02.02.2023) — holding property for a long time as material evidence, without active investigative actions and without re-assessing the need, violates the right to peaceful enjoyment of possessions; to assess proportionality, the duration of the measure, the course of the proceedings and the consequences for the owner are taken into account.

The court's conclusion: a long arrest of the funds of people who have no status in the proceedings is a disproportionate interference with their right to property, and the prosecutor did not prove that keeping it was necessary. The arrest was lifted.

It is also worth noting Part 1 of Article 100 of the CPC: material evidence handed to a party to the proceedings or seized by it must be returned to the holder as soon as possible. The court cited this provision, and it works as an argument for any owner: the state cannot hold property longer than the tasks of the proceedings require.

How to draft a motion to lift the arrest of property

The motion is filed in writing with the investigating judge or the court, depending on the stage of the proceedings. The structure that worked in our case:

1. Details of the proceedings: the court case number, the criminal proceedings number, the date and the judge of the ruling on the arrest.
2. What exactly is arrested: the account, the card, the bank — as written in the ruling on the arrest.
3. The applicant's status: the owner of the property, who was not present when the arrest was considered and has no procedural status.
4. Origin of the property: statements, contracts, receipts, the history of deals on the exchange — everything that explains where the funds came from.
5. Ground for lifting: the need has gone (investigative actions are done, a lot of time has passed) and/or the arrest is unjustified.
6. Legal reasoning: Articles 170, 173, 174 and 132 of the CPC, Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention, ECtHR case law.
7. The request: to lift the arrest imposed by the ruling of a given date on a specific account or card.

If you cannot travel to court, it is worth asking in the motion to consider it without the applicant and the representative. In our case the court considered the motion exactly this way.

What to do after the ruling lifting the arrest

A ruling lifting an arrest during trial proceedings cannot be appealed separately, as its text states directly. The next task is to make sure the bank actually unblocks the funds.

• Get a copy of the ruling from the court or download it from the Unified State Register of Court Decisions and give it to the bank with a written request to remove the restrictions.
• Check whether the account has other arrests — in the same or another case, or in enforcement proceedings. The bank removes only the restriction that has been lifted.
• Keep proof of the unblocking: a bank statement or certificate. You will need it if the question about these funds comes up again.

An arrest in criminal proceedings is not the only kind of arrest of accounts. An enforcement officer in enforcement proceedings imposes it under completely different rules, and it is lifted differently; there is an example in the article on declaring a writ of execution not subject to enforcement. If the question about cryptocurrency came up in a family dispute, see the article on division of cryptocurrency in a divorce.

Typical mistakes of owners of arrested cards

• They wait for the arrest to "go away by itself". An arrest stays in force until it is lifted. If nobody files a motion, the funds can stay blocked until the verdict.
• They argue with the bank. The bank only carries out the court's ruling and cannot lift the arrest itself.
• They have no explanation of where the money came from. Without statements and documents on the deals, the court has nothing on which to base a finding of lawful origin.
• They file the motion in the wrong place. After the indictment is sent to court, the investigating judge no longer considers the arrest.
• They give explanations to the investigators without a lawyer. A person with no status who tries to "explain everything alone" can accidentally become a witness, with all the consequences. How to build a defence in such situations is on the page of a criminal defence lawyer.

Frequently asked questions

My card was arrested in a criminal case, although I am not suspected of anything. Can the arrest be lifted?

Yes. Part 1 of Article 174 of the CPC gives the right to file a motion to lift the arrest not only to a suspect or an accused, but also to any other owner or holder of the property who was not present when the arrest was considered. That was exactly the situation in case No. 463/3759/26: my client had no procedural status, and his card was arrested as possible material evidence in proceedings about the theft of funds through a remote banking system. The arrest lasted ten months. We filed a motion with statements from the bank and the crypto exchange explaining the origin of the money, and on 22.10.2026 the court lifted the arrest. Having no status in the proceedings does not by itself lift the arrest, but it matters: the court assesses how burdensome the arrest is for a person who is not accused of anything. The result of one case does not automatically carry over to others.

Where to file a motion to lift the arrest of property?

It depends on the stage of the criminal proceedings. During the pre-trial investigation the motion is considered by the investigating judge, and during trial proceedings by the court hearing the case. This is provided directly by Part 1 of Article 174 of the CPC. You can find out the stage from the investigator or the prosecutor, or find the case in the Unified State Register of Court Decisions by the criminal proceedings number: if it contains rulings on scheduling a preparatory hearing, the indictment is already in court. In case No. 463/3759/26 the arrest was imposed by an investigating judge, but when the motion was filed, the case was already being heard by the Lychakivskyi District Court of Lviv, so the motion was filed with that court. A mistake with the stage costs time: a motion filed in the wrong place is returned, and you have to file again. The motion can be considered without the applicant if you ask for that.

What evidence is needed for the court to lift the arrest of funds on a card?

The main thing is to explain where the money on the card came from and to show that the arrest is no longer justified. In case No. 463/3759/26 we confirmed the lawful origin of the funds with statements from JSC CB PrivatBank and from the cryptocurrency exchange service Binance. The court referred to Part 2 of Article 328 of the Civil Code of Ukraine: the right of ownership is presumed to be acquired lawfully unless a court has found the acquisition unlawful. The second block is the state of the investigation. The prosecutor confirmed that all investigative actions had been carried out with the accounts and that there was no evidence that the funds were stolen. If you have no such confirmation from the prosecutor, time works for the owner: the longer the arrest lasts without new investigative actions, the harder it is for the prosecution to explain why it is needed. It helps to add contracts, receipts and correspondence with counterparties — everything that links each large receipt to a lawful deal.

How long can an arrest of property last in a criminal case?

The CPC sets no specific time limit for the arrest of property: under Part 1 of Article 170 it is a temporary measure that stays in force until it is lifted under the established procedure. So an arrest can drag on for months and years if the owner does nothing. At the same time, duration is a strong argument for lifting it. In case No. 463/3759/26 the court expressly took into account that the arrest had lasted ten months and held it to be a disproportionate interference with the right to property of people with no procedural status. The court referred to the ECtHR judgment in "Akshin Garayev v. Azerbaijan" of 02.02.2023: holding property as evidence for a long time, without active investigative actions and without re-assessing the need, violates the right to peaceful enjoyment of possessions. Part 1 of Article 100 of the CPC also requires material evidence to be returned to the holder as soon as possible. So the longer an arrest lasts with no movement in the proceedings, the stronger the owner's position.

Can I appeal the ruling on the arrest instead of filing a motion to lift it?

You can, but it is a different tool with different time limits. A ruling of an investigating judge on the arrest of property is appealed through the court of appeal; the CPC sets a short time limit for this, which for a person who was not present at the hearing runs from the day the copy of the ruling is received. An appeal fits when the arrest was unjustified from the start and you learned of it quickly. A motion to lift the arrest under Article 174 of the CPC has no time limit and lets you rely on new circumstances: that the investigative actions are already done, that a lot of time has passed, that the prosecutor has no evidence. In case No. 463/3759/26 we used the motion, because the main argument was the length of the arrest and the completion of the investigative actions. A court ruling lifting the arrest during trial proceedings cannot be appealed. The two routes can be combined, but it is better to choose after reading the ruling on the arrest.

What to do if the card was blocked after selling cryptocurrency through P2P?

First find out what exactly happened: a block by the bank under its internal financial monitoring rules and an arrest under an investigating judge's ruling are different things, with different ways of protection. If the bank refers to a court ruling, find it in the Unified State Register of Court Decisions or ask for the details of the proceedings. Then collect evidence that the deal was lawful: the order on the exchange, the correspondence with the buyer, the confirmation of the cryptocurrency transfer, the bank statement showing the receipt. In case No. 463/3759/26 the lawfulness of the funds was confirmed by statements from the bank and from the cryptocurrency exchange service Binance, and the court accepted them. Do not correspond with unknown people who offer to "unblock" the card for money, and do not give explanations to the investigators without a lawyer: a person with no status can become a witness or even a suspect if the explanations turn out badly. It is worth filing the motion to lift the arrest once the evidence is collected.

This material is based on the ruling of the Lychakivskyi District Court of Lviv of 22.10.2026 in case No. 463/3759/26, where I represented one of the applicants, the owner of the arrested card. Personal data of the participants is not given. The article is for information only and is not legal advice for your situation; check that the cited provisions are in force on the date you apply.

Was your card or account arrested in a criminal case that has nothing to do with you? Write to me — we will find the ruling on the arrest, work out who will consider the motion, and collect evidence of the lawful origin of the funds. Consultations are held in Ukrainian or Russian; written communication in English is available.