Ethereum Foundation Stakes $1.25M War Chest to Shield Tornado Cash’s Roman Storm

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Hassan Shittu

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Hassan Shittu

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June 13, 2025

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The Ethereum Foundation has pledged $500,000 to support the legal defense of Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm, who faces federal charges in the United States.

In addition to the direct donation, the foundation said it will match up to $750,000 in community contributions.

Ethereum Foundation Steps in to Support Roman Storm as Tornado Cash Trial Looms

Storm is set to stand trial on July 14, 2025, in Manhattan federal court. He is charged with conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitter, conspiracy to launder money, and conspiracy to violate U.S. sanctions.

The Ethereum Foundation described its donation as a stand for privacy and open-source development.

“Privacy is normal, and writing code is not a crime,” it wrote in a statement posted Friday on X.

Storm was indicted in August 2023 for his role in building and maintaining Tornado Cash, a crypto mixer accused of facilitating the laundering of over $1 billion in illicit funds.

The service allegedly allowed users to obscure the source and destination of transactions, an activity that U.S. authorities say was exploited by hackers and criminal networks to move stolen assets.

Storm’s trial comes as prosecutors and regulators increase scrutiny of crypto tools tied to privacy and decentralization. His defense has argued that the case threatens the foundation of decentralized finance (DeFi) by criminalizing open-source development.

“In 31 days, I face trial,” Storm said in a Friday post on X. “The DOJ wants to bury DeFi, saying I should’ve controlled it, added KYC, never built it. SDNY is trying to crush me, blocking every expert witness. If I lose, DeFi dies with me.”

His co-founder, Roman Semenov, was also charged in the case but remains at large, reportedly in Russia.

A third developer, Alexey Pertsev, was convicted of money laundering by a Dutch court in May and sentenced to more than five years in prison. He is currently under electronic monitoring as his appeal progresses.

Tornado Cash was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) in 2022. The agency claimed the tool had facilitated over $7 billion in illicit transactions since 2019 and failed to adopt safeguards against criminal misuse.

Storm’s legal team previously sought to dismiss the charges, arguing that OFAC overstepped its authority by sanctioning the mixer’s smart contracts.

That motion followed a separate ruling in a related case that questioned the agency’s reach over decentralized code.

With the trial approaching, the Ethereum Foundation’s contribution marks one of the most high-profile shows of support yet for Storm and raises broader questions about how far developers should be held responsible for permissionless code.

Vitalik Buterin Donates $170K to Support Tornado Cash Developers Early This Year

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin donated 50 ETH, worth around $170,000 in January 2025, to support the legal defense of Tornado Cash developers Roman Storm and Alexey Pertsev.

The contribution was confirmed through the Juicebox project “Free Pertsev and Storm,” which has so far raised over $650,000 through JusticeDAO, a decentralized fund backed by the crypto community.

Buterin’s support follows mounting legal pressure on the developers. In May, the U.S. Department of Justice confirmed it would proceed with federal charges against Storm, including allegations of money laundering and sanctions violations.

The charge relating to operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business was later dropped. The legal campaign against Storm has also sparked backlash across the crypto space.

In April, the DeFi Education Fund urged the Trump administration to step in, calling the DOJ’s actions a “lawless prosecution” of open-source software developers.

The petition has since gained momentum, with signatures from key industry figures including Coinbase’s Fred Ehrsam, Paradigm’s Matt Huang, and Ethereum core developer Tim Beiko.