The developer’s lawyer, Roma Storm, is considering seeking a mistial after federal prosecutors have presented it in witness and expert testimony, and it has become seemingly barely related to the client’s privacy protocol tornado cash, the lawyer said Monday in federal court in New York.
A mistrial is a trial that is deemed invalid due to an error in judicial proceedings or misconduct, such as the inappropriate approval of the examiner or evidence. In the event of fraud, new judges and ju judges and cases may be dismissed or retried.
A few days after the federal government called on Taiwan-born Hanfen Lin to testify against Storm, defense raised the possibility of misunderstanding to Judge Catherine Polk Faira on Monday.
According to her testimony, Lynn lost about $250,000 in 2021 in a pig slaughter fraud. This is a type of fraud that encourages fraudsters to gain the trust of their victims and send their accomplice funds, usually in the form of cryptocurrency. Lynn testified that he joined a Crypto Recovery Service called Payback in the hopes of recovering the stolen funds. The business later sent her a report suggesting that some of her funds had traveled through tornado cash, Lynn said in her testimony.
However, the defense pushed back that version of the event and claimed on-chain evidence, failing to support Payback’s claim that some of Lynn’s funds were handed over tornado cash.
“Based on a weekend investigation, we don’t know that any of Ms Lynn’s funds went to Tornado cash,” Storm’s lawyer said Monday. Inner City Press. “We need to discuss with Mr. Storm about moving in for Mistry.”
There is a possibility of fraud as blockchain experts have shown great interest in Storm’s criminal trials. The case is poised to clarify the legal liability of coders under existing US law, and is primarily portrayed by supporters of the Cypherpunk movement as a proxy in the fight to protect technology that provides privacy from authoritarian infringement, where efforts to maintain those rights in public safety goals.
In addition to counting one conspiracy to wash the funds, Storm is charged with running an unlicensed money transfer business and violating US sanctions. He faces up to 45 years in prison if convicted in all respects.
However, notable on-chain detectives have made holes in lawsuits against the federal storm, reinforcing defense claims that there may be grounds for misstatements.
Taylor Monaghan, a leading security researcher at Software Wallet Metamask, wrote in a series of social media posts on Friday that on-chain data supports claims that Lynn’s funds do not appear to reach Tornado’s cash.
“There’s nothing that (collecting team members) are tracking. There’s no tornado cash,” Monaghan wrote in one of his posts, referring to on-chain data analytics performed using transaction numbers for payments sent to scammers.
Zachxbt, a well-known pseudonym on-chain sluth, approved the discovery of Monaghan in his own social media post on Friday.
They also told her to email Coinbase, Binance and FTX.
Yes, I need to see this.
A pig slaughter case that follows TC, Coinbase, FTX and Binance. 🤨
Unfortunately, they didn’t have an address for “NTU” in my previous research, as her TXN hadn’t hadhed out in court. pic.twitter.com/eofeaa7vvn
-tay💖 (@tayvano_) July 18, 2025
Monaghan also questioned the legitimacy of Payback’s services and called employees “silly idiots.”
The retrieval did not respond immediately Decrypt’s Request a comment.
Exploits and fraud have long pose great risks to decentralized financial users, spurring the so-called blockchain detective cottage industry, offering to recover lost funds from exploits and other cyberattacks.
But neither can they authenticate the entire crypto industry that regulates who can call themselves “chain detectives,” nor can they provide recovery services to hack victims.
Finally, I got time to review the TXN you shared, and I agree.
Idk has been following the wrong path to a tornado since ruining how it was bad as a company that failed to properly track instant exchange deposit 1 hops from stolen addresses…
the…
– Zachxbt (@zachxbt) July 21, 2025
The FBI’s San Diego Field Office seized the Payback website last year as part of its efforts to “crash new fraud” to fraud victims of cryptocurrency fraud.
Nevertheless, prosecutors argued that they would immediately provide evidence that Lynn’s funds actually went through tornado cash.
“We have expert IRS agent George. He testifies about some short hops to tornado cash,” US lawyer Thane Lane told court Monday. Inner City Press It has been reported.
“I have never seen this lack of communication in a criminal case that I have been a main sided,” Judge Phila said according to the publication.
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