Lawyers: There Are Inconsistencies in Tornado Cash Case
Coin Center, an industry advocacy organization for cryptocurrencies, has declared that recent allegations issued against the two co-founders of the mixer, Tornado Cash, ran contrary to FinCEN rules and guidance.
On August 23, the US Department of Justice initiated a case towards developers Roman Storm and Roman Semenov for possible money laundering.
Authorities apprehended Storm, while Semenov is still on the loose but was placed on the sanctioned list by OFAC. Per the Coin Center, the indictment stated the suspects “engaged in the transfer of funds on behalf of the public” without registering with FinCEN. However, law enforcement had not produced any data pertaining to transactions carried out directly by Storm and Semenov.
The only available details of the investigation, as per the lawyers, proved the development and distribution of software for anonymizing deals, which do not break FinCEN regulations and the Bank Secrecy Act.
The 2019 guidance from FinCEN, referenced by Coin Center, pointed out that those “who only grant delivery, communication, or network access services used to transfer funds” are excluded from the definition.
