Ethereum (ETH) creator Vitalik Buterin says that the US government’s targeting of early Bitcoin (BTC) pioneer Roger Ver is an “absurd” and unreasonable persecution.

Ver, an early Bitcoin investor who later decided to support the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) fork, was arrested in Spain in late April of 2024 at the direction of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).

He faces multiple charges, including mail fraud, tax evasion and filing false tax returns amounting to a maximum of 109 years in prison.

However, Buterin says the charges against Ver appear politically motivated and compares the case to that of Ross Ulbricht, who was sentenced to life in prison for creating the online marketplace The Silk Road before receiving a pardon from President Trump.

“Going to prison for the rest of your life over non-violent tax offenses is absurd. The case against Roger seems very politically motivated; like with Ross Ulbricht, there have been plenty of people and corporations who have been accused of far worse and yet faced sentences far milder than what Roger is facing.

The argument that the flashlight on him is motivated by things he said (namely, his advocacy of freedom and refusal to accept the legitimacy of coercive state power) seems compelling. This is worth standing against because selective prosecution for unrelated offenses is a common way of circumventing protections like the First Amendment (or in more authoritarian countries, even more basic things like the moral prohibition against punishing people for the crimes of their family members).”

Despite renouncing his United States citizenship in 2014 after obtaining citizenship in Saint Kitts and Nevis, authorities say Ver should have filed tax returns that reported capital gains from the sale of his worldwide assets, including his Bitcoin, and reported the fair market value of his assets.

Says Buterin,

“The US tax-by-citizenship and associated exit tax regime is extreme; the former is shared by almost no other countries in the world, and the latter is on the high end of what countries do (eg. UK only charges capital gains if you return within 5 years)…

Genuine good faith mistakes should be treated by giving the actor the opportunity to pay back taxes if needed with interest and penalties, not with prosecution.”

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