Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm has called the crypto community and privacy advocates to help him raise an additional $1 million in the coming weeks to continue his legal defense and the battle for privacy tools.
Tornado Cash Founder Faces Fundraising Shortfall
The co-founder of crypto mixer Tornado Cash, Roman Storm, has updated his fundraising target and is pushing to raise over $1 million to continue funding his legal battle. Over the weekend, Storm revealed that his team is facing a “critical shortfall” ahead of the start of his July trial.
The Tornado Cash co-founder explained that he needs to raise $500,000 in the next few days and $1.5 million within a couple of weeks to cover escalating legal fees, expert witnesses, and research.
He detailed that his planned 2-week trial, scheduled to begin on July 14, is now expected to last 3-4 weeks due to “complex legal arguments and unforeseen witnesses and evidence.” As a result, expenses for expert testimonies, thorough research, and his legal team have significantly increased.
My team is working nonstop to defend code as free speech, protect software development, and push back against government overreach that threatens us all. If you can help, please donate now – every contribution counts in this battle for our freedoms.
For context, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Tornado Cash in August 2022 for “failing to impose effective controls” to prevent malicious actors from laundering funds through the protocol, including $455 million by North Korea’s Lazarus Group.
Storm and the crypto mixer’s developer, Alexey Pertsev, were detained after the sanctions. Pertsev was sentenced to 5 years in the Netherlands after being found guilty of money laundering by the s-Hertogenbosch Court of Appeal in May 2024, and is currently working on his appeal.
Meanwhile, Storm was detained in Washington in August 2023 and faces three charges, including conspiracy to commit money laundering, conspiracy to commit sanctions violations, and conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business.
Storm pleaded not guilty to all charges and was freed on a $2 million bond. However, if convicted, he could face up to 45 years in prison. His trial, initially scheduled for December 2024, has been delayed twice.
Crypto Community Aids Storm’s Legal Defense
On Monday, Julian Zawistowski of the Golem Foundation shared that they had donated 50 ETH, worth around $150,000, stating that they’ve “always walked the walk when it comes to important causes. (…) Time for others in our industry to step up too.”
Meanwhile, developer and contributor to Meta Cartel DAO Bill Warren affirmed that the organization had donated all the funds in its treasury to support Storm’s case. Warren also urged privacy and decentralization advocates to contribute to the Tornado Cash co-founder’s legal defense.
Earlier this year, crypto investment firm Paradigm donated over one million dollars to aid the Tornado Cash co-founder’s legal battle. The firm’s co-founder, Matt Huang, revealed that Paradigm was giving $1.25 million to help fund Storm’s legal defense.
Notably, the DeFi Education Fund sent a letter signed by multiple industry leaders to AI and Crypto Czar David Sacks, urging the White House to end the Department of Justice’s war on open-source developers.
The April letter affirmed that trying to hold software developers criminally liable for how third parties use their code will set a terrible precedent and “freeze” technological innovation in the US, which would oppose Trump’s promise to make America “the crypto capital of the planet.”
It also highlighted that the Southern District of New York (SDNY) is continuing its prosecution of Storm with charges related to money transmitting and other liabilities that could punish the Tornado Cash co-founder for the conduct of unrelated bad actors.
As of this writing, Storm has raised $2.12 million, 61% of the $3.5 million goal for his legal defense fund.
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