Just when you thought your “worst week ever” involved losing your phone charger and discovering you’re out of Pinot, imagine being Roman Storm. Yes, the actual, factual co-founder of Tornado Cash, whose criminal trial is hurtling at him faster than my monthly packaged salad expiry date.
Roman, however, appears to be swapping existential panic for a cool blend of denial and dry humor worthy of any brunch table. In a recent (likely slightly awkward) chat with Crypto in America, he basically said: “Um, hi, government? You’re prosecuting me for writing code. Literally, just typing things into a laptop. Not for, you know, any actual crimes.” 👨💻🤷♂️
To recap: the federal powers that be have slapped Roman with three felony charges — money laundering conspiracy and violating sanctions, among others. The allegations? That Tornado Cash was the virtual laundromat for more than a billion bucks in swindled crypto, some with a charming North Korean twist. (Seriously, why are the North Koreans everywhere lately?)
Storm, looking approximately as stressed as someone told the cheese board was vegan, reasserts his not-guilty stance. His version: the sole purpose of Tornado Cash was to protect privacy, then once unleashed, the project became its own weird crypto toddler, running amok entirely out of his parental control.
“Did I have some sort of underground tunnel to evil masterminds? No. Did I sip kimchi martinis with North Korean hackers? No. Did I, at any point, orchestrate a secret bond-villain-level scheme?” Roman basically says, “No, I was too busy writing code and, frankly, had no off-switch for other people’s mischief.”
“When Tornado Cash became fully decentralized and trustless, there wasn’t much activity going on at that time. We thought it was just going to be another project that would sit in our junkyard. We have so many projects like that as software engineers. We did not anticipate that.…
— Roman Storm 🇺🇸 🌪️ (@rstormsf) July 4, 2025
Which brings us to the parade of other side characters! Roman was arrested in August 2023, immediately leap-frogging many hopefuls on the “How Bad Can It Get?” chart. Co-founder Alexey Pertsev went straight to Dutch prison for money laundering (64 months, but who’s counting), while Roman Semenov, the third musketeer, is at large, location unknown, possibly hiding underneath someone’s standing desk.
Meanwhile Storm is on a strict ‘fun diet’: no bank account, no crypto wallets, and not even a friendly cashback reward to his name. “I’m being punished before being proven guilty,” he grumbles, like a man who just got banned from the free samples stand. 🥲
Why should the rest of us care, you ask? Because (drumroll, please) if the court throws LEGO bricks at Roman, he says developers and open-source innovation in American crypto could land on the same bonfire. “If I lose my case, DeFi dies with me,” he warns, which frankly is the sort of high-stakes language you usually reserve for people holding hostages in action films.
Trial Day is scheduled for July 14 in New York. While Roman is playing it mysterious about whether he’ll take the stand (perhaps he’s saving that for the Netflix documentary), the main defense: Code is speech, open-source tools aren’t crimes, and basically don’t shoot the programming messenger.
For those keeping score — nerds and internet personalities everywhere are lining up in support. Even Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has donated to the defense fund. Unclear if he also sent snacks. 🍪
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2025-07-04 10:35