Prosecutors within the Southern District of New York (SDNY) pushed again in opposition to the Twister Money co-founder’s protection forward of a key listening to later this week, arguing that his dismissal claims lack benefit.
Justice Division says Twister Money founder’s protection is ‘not relevant’
On Tuesday, U.S. Lawyer Jay Clayton for the Southern District of New York despatched a letter to Choose Catherine Faira rejecting a latest letter supporting Twister Money co-founder Roman Storm’s movement for acquittal.
Mr. Clayton’s response was dated April 2nd. motion The lawsuit was filed by Storm’s protection attorneys, who argued that the 2026 Supreme Court docket case Cox Communications v. Sony Music Leisure supported Storm’s pending Rule 29 claims.
The Cox case challenged the civil legal responsibility of Web service suppliers to subscribers who dedicated copyright infringement. The Supreme Court docket dominated that Cox was not answerable for contributing to copyright infringement on customers’ accounts as a result of it didn’t induce customers to infringe their copyrights or present companies in keeping with the infringement.
on tuesday filingU.S. attorneys argued that “defendants and Twister Money Companies are removed from Cox,” and asserted that “even when Cox had any applicability right here, that inference could be of no help to defendants given the materially totally different information at challenge.”
Prosecutors file letter pushing again on Storm's protection. Supply: Interior Metropolis Press on X
“As detailed within the authorities’s response to Defendants’ Rule 29 complaints, and in distinction to Cox’s sturdy system for responding to violations, Defendants deliberately carried out half-hearted measures that they described as ‘simply avoidable’ to fight legal use of Twister Money Companies, and their objective was to distract regulation enforcement,” the doc reads.
Clayton added that as a result of there was no proof that Twister Money’s founders had efficient anti-money laundering (AML) measures in place, Storm’s use of the crypto mixer was “at greatest a falsification of accounting, and at worst, full misdirection.”
Notably, the U.S. Treasury Division’s Workplace of International Property Management (OFAC) sanctioned Twister Money in August 2022 for failing to impose efficient controls to stop malicious actors from laundering cash via the protocol, together with $455 million by North Korea-linked hacker group Lazarus Group.
Nevertheless, this sanction was overturned in March 2025 after the Court docket of Appeals dominated in November 2024 that OFAC overstepped its authority by sanctioning immutable decentralized sensible contracts reasonably than authorized entities.
US prosecutors request retrial of Roman Storm
Prosecutors’ newest transfer follows his March letter asking for the Twister Money co-founder to be retried on two counts on which jurors deadlocked final August. In his letter, Mr. Clayton requested Choose Failla to reschedule Roman Storm’s retrial, with trial dates starting from October fifth to October twelfth, 2026.
For context, Mr. Storm was detained and indicted following the Twister Money sanctions and charged with conspiracy to launder cash, conspiracy to violate sanctions, and conspiracy to function an unauthorized cash switch enterprise.
The jury discovered Storm responsible of 1 depend of conspiracy to function an unauthorized cash switch enterprise, however couldn’t attain a unanimous determination on the opposite two expenses. However, a hung jury didn’t represent a verdict of not responsible, which opened the door to a doable retrial on these expenses.
In September, Storm filed a movement of not responsible asking the choose to throw out the case or put aside the decision, saying the prosecution’s proof was legally inadequate. Legal professionals for the Twister Money founder argued that the federal government had not confirmed that he meant to assist unhealthy actors launder cash via the platform, invalidating the premise for his conviction primarily based on negligence and negligence.
Prosecutors and Mr. Storm’s lawyer are at the moment scheduled to fulfill on April 9 for oral arguments on the pending Rule 29 movement, which may decide the destiny of this essential authorized battle.
The whole crypto market capitalization sits at $2.32 trillion on the one-week chart. Supply: TOTAL on TradingView
Featured picture from Unsplash.com, chart from TradingView.com
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