A co-founder and developer of crypto mixer Twister Money has filed a movement to have the US authorities’s lawsuit in opposition to him dismissed.
Final yr, the U.S. Division of Justice (DOJ) charged Roman Storm and Roman Semenov, one other founder, with aiding the North Korean hacking group Lazarus in laundering illicit funds via the Twister Money mixing service.
Legal professionals for Storm say in a brand new court docket submitting that the developer merely created decentralized software program options to “present monetary privateness to official cryptocurrency customers,” which isn’t a criminal offense.
Storm’s attorneys say that the DOJ’s cash laundering costs are “fatally flawed” and ought to be dismissed pursuant to the Federal Rule of Legal Process.
“Cash laundering requires a ‘monetary transaction’ involving a ‘monetary establishment,’ but Twister Money’s publicly obtainable protocol and the allegedly associated software program companies, whilst wrongfully characterised within the Indictment, don’t conduct any monetary transactions nor do they qualify as monetary establishments as a matter of legislation. Furthermore, the Indictment fails to allege details that might present that Mr. Storm entered right into a conspiratorial settlement with any dangerous actor to launder cash, or that he had the particular intent to commit cash laundering (nor may it).
Certainly, the Indictment itself makes clear he couldn’t have had such an settlement or such an intent as a result of the Twister Money protocol was developed and have become immutable earlier than the alleged legal conduct that’s on the middle of the cash laundering rely even occurred.”
Storm was launched on bail final yr, and on the time, Lawyer Common Merrick Garland mentioned the builders deliberately helped criminals launder and conceal funds with Twister Money.
“As alleged within the indictment, the defendants operated a $1 billion scheme designed to assist different criminals launder and conceal funds utilizing cryptocurrency, together with by laundering a whole bunch of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} on behalf of a state-sponsored North Korean cybercrime group sanctioned by the US authorities.
These costs ought to function yet one more warning to those that assume they’ll flip to cryptocurrency to hide their crimes and conceal their identities, together with cryptocurrency mixers: it doesn’t matter how refined your scheme is or what number of makes an attempt you have got made to anonymize your self, the DOJ will discover you and maintain you accountable on your crimes.”
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