The money comes from Silk Road, including the property of a corrupt former agent. Washington has many billions of US dollars in BTC from the darknet.

As the saying goes? Crime doesn't pay. But for the American government well. She wants to $132 million in Bitcoin sales which she stole from criminals.

The sale follows a Maryland District Court ruling. The BTC were seized during the famous Silk Road investigation.

It involves nearly 3,000 Bitcoin.

Silk Road was the largest trading center on the darknet, a part of the Internet accessible only through the TOR browser. In addition to activists and dissidents relying on concealment techniques, the darknet is also used by criminals.

Silk Road was founded in 2011 by Ross Ulbricht, a young programmer. He was arrested by the FBI in 2013 and convicted in 2015 - two life sentences plus 40 years. Silk Road was shut down.

The marketplace offered weapons, drugs and other illegal items for sale, often in exchange for Bitcoin.

You can read the full story of the spectacular case here.

The approximately 3,000 BTC in this case came from two different sources.

A portion goes back to a money launderer, Ryan Farace, who was sentenced to 54 years in prison.

The other part comes from the possession of a former U.S. agent, Shaun Bridges. He was part of the Baltimore Task Force against Silk Road, but stole BTC from the investigation. He was sentenced to six years in prison for this.

Bitcoin sales are regulated and will be personally monitored by the prosecutor's office, according to a statement.

Washington holds a total of more than 210,000 BTC, making him one of the largest hoarders of all. More than half of this comes from seizures on Silk Road.

The Bitcoin price is currently under pressure, mainly due to the sale by Grayscale, an asset manager and ETF sponsor. The company has sold more than $4 billion worth of BTC in recent weeks.