“With suspected ties to X“ isn't necessarily an element of the charges being brought. And the police can and do lie (or state “suspicion” on a very flimsy basis) when making public announcements related to arrests, and headlines often credulously repeat police spin rather than being grounded in facts.
While this tends to get the most attention (and still then not enough for the press to change) around police spin and media coverage related to police shootings, it is true far beyond that.
I dunno, there's a pretty big trend going on right now of producing tv shows / prodcasts about how ineffective (with a strong hint of incompentence) cops can be.
This didn’t happen with no lead up or context
Should we arrest the Tor developers because North Koreans use Tor?
“On Wednesday 10 August, the FIOD arrested a 29-year-old man in Amsterdam. He is suspected of involvement in concealing criminal financial flows and facilitating money laundering through the mixing of cryptocurrencies through the decentralised Ethereum mixing service Tornado Cash”
So the suspicion is that he didn’t only develop the tool, but was involved in its illegal use, too.
Headline: Arrest of developer with suspected ties to North Korean money laundering
Body: He has also previously contributed to Tornado Cash.
But all we know is what they decided to tell us... he's a developer of privacy tech. If the facts change, I'll change my mind.