Vitalik Buterin Donates 50 ETH to the Legal Fund of Tornado Cash Developers

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has made a contribution to the authorized protection fund for Twister Money builders Roman Storm and Alexey Pertsev.

Buterin gave 50 ETH, valued at roughly $170,000 at writing time, to assist the builders as they navigate mounting authorized challenges.

The Donation

The information was shared by way of a Dec. 31 post on X by the Juicebox venture Free Pertsev and Storm. One of many beneficiaries, Roman Storm, expressed gratitude for the funds in a separate publish, describing it as a present of Buterin’s management and help.

 “Immense gratitude to Vitalik Buterin for his beneficiant donation to my authorized protection fund. Your unwavering help and management by instance proceed to encourage us all. Thanks for standing with me throughout this difficult time,” he wrote.

He additionally revealed that the current donation represents about 25% of the $650,000 obtainable by way of JusticeDAO, a community-driven initiative established to help their authorized battles.

In the meantime, this isn’t the primary time Buterin has been concerned in authorized protection efforts for controversial circumstances. In 2022, he gave out 10 ETH, valued at $30,980 on the time, to the AssangeDAO authorized fund created to help WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Extra just lately, in October, he provided 100 ETH, translating to about $240,000, to the Free Pertsev and Storm Juicebox. This was along with one other contribution he made in Could to the identical reason for 30 ETH, value round $113,000.

Twister Money Builders Face Ongoing Authorized Challenges

The Twister Money crypto mixing protocol has been within the information for all of the improper causes, particularly with accusations from authorities businesses that it was being exploited by malicious actors for illicit actions, together with cash laundering.

In August 2022, the U.S. Treasury’s Workplace of Overseas Belongings Management (OFAC) imposed sanctions on the platform, alleging that North Korean hackers had used it to launder greater than $7 billion in crypto since 2019.

The authorized motion intensified scrutiny on the service, with Dutch authorities arresting co-founder Alexey Pertsev in 2022. He was later discovered guilty of cash laundering in Could 2024, upon which he obtained a jail sentence of over 5 years. Pertsev is at the moment interesting the decision.

In the US, Storm and fellow developer Roman Semenov face prices of cash laundering, sanctions violations, and fraud for his or her involvement with the crypto mixer.

Storm was launched on bail and is awaiting trial, which has been rescheduled to April 14, 2025, after being postponed from its unique date in December 2024. In the meantime, Semenov stays at giant.