Already convicted of one felony charge and facing a possible retrial on two others, the Tornado Cash co-founder’s future is uncertain.
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More than 65 cryptocurrency and blockchain companies and advocacy groups have called on US President Donald Trump to step in as federal prosecutors may be preparing to retry Tornado Cash co-founder and developer Roman Storm.
In a letter to Trump dated Thursday and shared with Cointelegraph, advocacy organizations including the Solana Policy Institute, Blockchain Association and DeFi Education Fund, among others, made several requests regarding crypto-related policies.
The groups asked Trump to direct the IRS and US Treasury to clarify tax policy on digital assets, protect DeFi from regulators and encourage regulatory clarity through financial regulators like the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
Notable, however, was the letter’s request for Trump to “urge the Department of Justice to dismiss all open charges against Roman Storm” and support overturning his conviction for running an unlicensed money transmitting service.
“Recognizing that Storm’s work on Tornado Cash represents the publication of open-source software – not a financial crime,” said the letter. “Dropping the case would reaffirm the Administration’s commitment to protecting developers. Doing so will further support that code is speech under the First Amendment and signals that the US will protect innovation.”
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Storm was of running an unlicensed money transmittal business, one of three charges he had been facing. The jury did not decide whether the Tornado Cash co-founder engaged in a conspiracy to commit money laundering and a conspiracy to violate sanctions.
Storm, who was indicted in August 2023 for the three felony charges, pleaded not guilty. He repeatedly claimed he was innocent by echoing the rallying cry from many of his supporters: “Writing code is not a crime.“
About two weeks after the verdict was handed down, a Justice Department official run by the cryptocurrency advocacy organization American Innovation Project. Matthew Galeotti, the acting assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s criminal division, said that “merely writing code, without ill intent, is not a crime.”
Despite Galeotti’s comments, Jay Clayton, the interim US attorney for the Southern District of New York, filed with the court on Nov. 12 to oppose Storm’s motion for acquittal. As of Thursday, the parties are scheduled to return to court for a conference to discuss the matter on Jan. 22, and no sentencing hearing for the single conviction appeared on the public docket.
Though a US president has some influence over the Justice Department in directing policy objectives, norms have primarily been one of the barriers in stopping a president from violating prosecutorial independence, i.e., ordering a federal prosecutor to drop charges or indict someone.
Cointelegraph reached out to the Solana Policy Institute regarding the letter’s request that Trump intervene in the Storm case, but had not received a response at the time of publication.
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