Federal Prosecutors Dismiss Tornado Cash Developer's Motion to Drop Charges
The crypto mixing platform's co-founder Roman Storm continues to await a potential retrial on two separate charges following a hung jury in 2025.
The US Attorney for the Southern District of New York (SDNY), Jay Clayton, who previously served as Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) chair, has issued a rebuttal to Roman Storm's motion for acquittal, strongly condemning what he describes as the Tornado Cash co-founder's illegal activities.
According to a Tuesday court filing submitted to the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, Clayton characterized Storm's purported criminal activity involving Tornado Cash as "window dressing at best and outright misdirection at worst," while dismissing attempts to incorporate a civil copyright dispute into his legal defense strategy.
Clayton's filing came in response to a Thursday notification from Storm's legal team indicating their plan to reference a 2026 Supreme Court decision, Cox Communications, Inc. v. Sony Music Entertainment, as evidence supporting their argument regarding the Tornado Cash co-founder's intention to engage in the alleged offenses: conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to violate sanctions.
The US Attorney argued that Storm's actions "bear no resemblance" to the circumstances presented in the Cox decision, a case centered on civil liability related to copyright infringement. Clayton maintained that the Tornado Cash co-founder failed to demonstrate any evidence of implementing effective anti-money-laundering controls.
The defendant's conduct simply is not comparable to the conduct at issue in Cox. In any event, a civil copyright case has no relevance here in the first place.
Jay Clayton, US Attorney for SDNY
In August of last year, Storm was found guilty by a jury on charges of conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business, though jurors reached an impasse regarding the conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to violate sanctions allegations, creating the possibility for a subsequent retrial. The proceedings have garnered significant interest throughout the cryptocurrency sector regarding the extent to which software developers can be held accountable for their programming work.
Legal representatives for both the prosecution and defense in Storm's case have a scheduled meeting set for Thursday.
Attorney behind memo calling for end to crypto "regulation by prosecution" gets top DOJ job
In the previous week, President Donald Trump removed Attorney General Pam Bondi from her position, appointing Deputy AG Todd Blanche as the temporary leader of the Justice Department pending Senate confirmation of a permanent replacement. Blanche, who had earlier served as Trump's personal legal counsel, authored an April 2025 memorandum advocating for the termination of what he characterized as "regulation by prosecution" within the Justice Department's operations.
While Blanche refrained from specifically mentioning Storm in his memo, he stated that the department would "not pursue actions against the platforms that [criminal] enterprises utilize to conduct their illegal activities" and advocated for the cessation of prosecutions that conflict with this principle.
In a March post on X, Storm referenced Blanche's memorandum following prosecutors' announcement of their intention to retry the Tornado Cash co-founder on the two charges that resulted in a deadlocked jury.
The 2 counts = up to 40 years in federal prison. For writing open-source code. For a protocol I don't control. For transactions I never touched. A jury already couldn't agree this was criminal. But the SDNY prosecutors want to keep trying with the hope of getting a different answer.
Roman Storm
The manner in which Blanche might leverage his current position to shape DOJ policy remains uncertain, as does the duration of his tenure as acting AG. Clayton has requested that a federal judge schedule an October retrial for Storm, though no official date had been established as of Tuesday.