The Roman Storm, one of the creators behind the Tornado Cash Protocol, is looking for another $ 1.5 million to cover the mounted of legal costs as his landmark crypto trial enters the third week.
In an “urgent call for support,” storm Question For another $ 1.5 million in a July 26 X post, explaining that legal costs are “fast -paced.”
“It’s like crazy, but I need again ~ $ 1.5mm,” Storm wrote, while Noting In a separate X post that his legal team was “working around the clock.”
“We forget what normal sleep feels. Every time it counts, and so does the costs,” he said. The crypto community already has Provided More than $ 3.9 million to fund legal storm fees for trial, which began on July 14 in Manhattan, New York.
Storm testing can establish a preceding for the criminalization of open-source privacy tools, bringing a serious risk to decentralized financial change while significantly restricting privacy rights.
However, crypto privacy tools such as Tornado Cash have gained negative attention because of their use of illicit actors-including North Korea supported by the state Lazarus Group – led by the US Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to punish the protocol in August 2022.
Yun Penalties have been revoked In January after Tornado Cash users filed a civil action against OFAC.
The crypto mix protocol is officially deleted from the OFAC blacklist in March.
The legal storm team is raised million -million
According to On the Roman Storm website, more than $ 3.2 million were raised to support STORM’s legal defense fund – 65% of a new $ 5 million goal.
The Ethereum Foundation also reached a $ 750,000 goal to assist the legal defense of the STORM.
Arguments are placed in court
According to the STORM website, the Trial in the Southern District of New York is expected to end within two weeks, around August 11.
US prosecutors argue that the Storm has conspired with the launder’s money, violated US penalties, and operates an unlicensed business that sends money related to his role in creating Tornado Cash.
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The legal storm team argues that Tornado Cash is never a business but a decentralized and unchanged protocol used beyond its control.
They rely on a 2019 Financial Crimes Enforcement Network Guide That is what developers of unidentified software say is not required to register as those who send money.
They also argue that the right to write and publish the code is protected as free speech under the first amendment to the US.
Tornado Cash’s two other co-creators were also affected
The storm built Tornado Cash next to Alexey Pertsev and Roman Semenov in 2019 after being inspired by Ethereum’s co-creation Vitalik Blerin to explore crypto privacy tools earlier that year.
Pertsev is Found to be guilty of money laundering In May 2024 in the Netherlands and current Verbal appeal. He was released from the Dutch’s caution under strict conditions, including electronic monitoring,
Semenov remains large and is in the US Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Wanted List.
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