Funding effort for Roman Storm grows as defense preps for possible retrial

Donations to the embattled software developer increased after Wednesday’s partial verdict and the possibility of a retrial.

Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm’s legal defense fund is seeing an influx of donations as the software creator’s defense team preps for a possible retrial on charges of money laundering and sanctions violations. The Ethereum Foundation on Thursday said it will match up to $500,000 in donations to Storm’s defense fund.

The jury in Storm’s trial was deadlocked — unable to reach a unanimous verdict — on two of the three counts against him, finding the developer guilty of running an unlicensed money transmitter.

“Mistrials by hung juries do not trigger double jeopardy, so the defendant can be tried again,” Brandon Ferrick, general counsel at Douro Labs, told Cointelegraph. 

Crypto industry executives and digital rights activists said Wednesday’s partial verdict sets a dangerous legal precedent for open-source software developers in the United States and impacts the development of privacy-preserving protocols and decentralized finance.

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