Lawyers representing Roman Storm, one of the co-founders of the cryptocurrency mixer Tornado Cash, have raised concerns about the evidence presented by U.S. prosecutors just days before his criminal trial. In a recent court filing, Storm’s defense team alleged that the prosecutors had misrepresented key Telegram messages taken from his co-defendant Alexey Pertsev’s phone. The defense team claimed that these messages lacked proper attribution and may have influenced the grand jury with false information.
The dispute revolves around chat logs extracted by U.S. agent Peter Dickerman from a device seized by Dutch authorities. Initially, the government stated that it had produced the relevant chats in September 2023. However, they corrected this claim, admitting that they only shared the final version of the chats, clearly marking forwarded messages, in December 2024.
Storm’s lawyers argued that this error is indicative of broader evidentiary failures, as the incomplete extraction omitted key metadata. They criticized U.S. prosecutors for insisting that the evidence is reliable despite these shortcomings. The defense team contended that the government’s theory is flawed, citing an example where forwarding a message does not necessarily imply guilt.
Storm is facing charges of conspiracy to commit money laundering and operating an unlicensed money transmission business through the Tornado Cash protocol.
In response to the defense’s objections, Assistant U.S. Attorneys Ben Arad, Thane Rehn, and Benjamin Gianforti acknowledged that earlier versions of the chats, produced in September 2023, were shared as plaintext files. They explained that these files did not identify when a message was forwarded and that the chat where the disputed message appeared was not included in that production.
According to the prosecutors, the version of the chats intended for trial was extracted directly by IRS Special Agent Dickerman and shared with the defense in December 2024. They argued that the formatting issues in the earlier versions do not impact the authenticity of the evidence.
The defense’s objection hinges on the degree of prosecutorial error, the ability to verify the original speaker, and the presence of other supporting evidence. Andrew Rossow, a digital media attorney, emphasized the importance of adhering to federal rules of evidence, which require the government to prove the authenticity of any evidence presented.
Late discovery of errors, as seen in this case, could strengthen the defense’s argument, especially if prosecutors were aware of these issues earlier but failed to disclose them. The “Brady rule,” established in the landmark case Brady v. Maryland (1963), imposes a duty on prosecutors to correct material misrepresentations throughout legal proceedings.
As the case unfolds, it will be crucial to assess the impact of these errors on the overall validity of the evidence presented. Decrypt reached out to the Department of Justice and Storm’s legal counsel for comment on the matter.
This article highlights the intricacies of the legal challenges faced by Roman Storm and underscores the importance of upholding transparency and accuracy in the criminal justice system.