The outcome of the Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm’s case has been met with mixed reactions. Despite finding him guilty on just one count out of three, the jury set a precedent that might put many developers at risk, forcing the crypto industry to keep fighting.
Storm, who created the crypto mixer in 2019, was found guilty of conspiracy to run an unlicensed money transmittal business, which might carry a sentence of up to five years in prison, Inner City Press reported. However, he avoided dozens of years in prison had he been found guilty of conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to violate North Korean sanctions.
“It’s a big win. The ‘1960’ charge is bullshit, and we’re going to fight it all the way. You know how President Trump said ‘fight, fight, fight’? We’ll do that too,” journalist Eleanor Terrett quoted Storm talking outside the courtroom. “1960” refers to 18 US Code § 1960, which prohibits unlicensed money transmitting businesses.
Storm’s lawyer Brian Klein also said that he expects his client to be fully vindicated.
Meanwhile, it seems that this fight is going to be supported by the wider crypto industry, as Section 1960 threatens many developers in the US working on non-custodial software, through which people engage in self-directed, peer-to-peer transactions.
Amanda Tuminelli, executive director and chief legal officer at DeFi Education Fund, a decentralized finance (DeFi) advocacy group, said they’ll continue supporting Storm as the Section 1960-related charge is “fundamentally flawed.”
“It is incredibly disappointing the jury hung on the other two counts – conspiracy to launder money and violate sanctions – because they also rest on the inaccurate, dangerous, and limitless principle that a software dev can be held responsible for third parties’ use of their code,” Tuminelli added.
Meanwhile, Peter Van Valkenburgh, executive director of crypto lobbying group Coin Center, pointed out that the developer was found guilty of a charge that directly contradicts guidance from FinCEN (Financial Crimes Enforcement Network).
“Like many in the industry have raised, we agree that non-custodial software through which people engage in self-directed, P2P transactions is not money transmission, and the government erred in charging this count in the first place,” Michele Korver, head of regulatory at a16z crypto and former federal prosecutor and regulator, said, adding that this decision could have a wide-ranging and unintended impact on the blockchain ecosystem as a whole.
Meanwhile, while some commenters online wondered whether “you can create money laundering crypto mixers if you just put them on multiple servers,” blockchain developers advocated that open-source, permissionless, privacy-preserving software is not a crime.
I stand with @rstormsf, @semenov_roman_, and @alex_pertsev.
undefined prestonvanloon.eth (@preston_vanloon) August 7, 2025
Writing open source code is not a crime.
Online financial privacy is not a crime.
Creating permissionless software is not a crime. https://t.co/NBzY9ucD9s pic.twitter.com/HPg2L3NJYw
The Storm case is related to another case in the US, in which the developers of the privacy-focused bitcoin wallet Samourai pleaded guilty to conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business, while avoiding charges related to conspiracy to commit money laundering.
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