Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Vitalik Buterin recently donated an additional 100 ETH worth about $240,000 to Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm’s legal defense fund. , this marks the third donation to this cause by the famous cryptocurrency builder.
According to the Defend Roman Storm crowdsourcing page, 148 different payments have been received to fund the developer’s defense. There is a total of over 327 ETH, worth approximately $785,000 at the time of this writing.
“I can’t explain how much this means to me. Thank you for your support over the years,” the Tornado Cash developer told Buterin after the donation.
Source: Free Pertsev and Storm.
Court orders Roman Storm case to proceed
On September 26, 2024, U.S. Judge Katherine Failla denied Storm’s motion to dismiss, allowing the case to proceed. Failla said the charges against Storm were not unfounded and that he “simply cannot accept Mr. Storm’s story that he is being prosecuted solely for writing code.”
Storm has pleaded not guilty to the charges and argued that Tornado Cash is open source software that anyone can use and that Tornado Cash developers have no control over.
If found guilty on all three charges, Storm faces up to 45 years in prison. It’s a prospect that has rocked the cryptocurrency community and sparked an outpouring of support for embattled software developers.
In June 2024, it was reported that JusticeDAO was formed to crowdsource defense funding for Tornado Cache developers. The group has raised over 654 ETH, valued at over $1.5 million at current market prices.
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Sanctions Can’t Stop a Tornado
Despite sanctions from the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and legal pressure from U.S. officials, deposits into Tornado Cash mixers reached approximately $1.9 billion in the first half of 2024. This represents a 50% increase in deposits over the previous total. Year.
The sanctions were only effective if Tornado Cash users attempted to route their funds through OFAC-compliant centralized exchanges using know-your-customer controls and destination wallet addresses that were pseudonyms and could be generated upon request.
magazine: Tornado Cash 2.0: A race to build a safe and legal coin mixer