A U.S. federal judge has postponed the retrial of Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm to April 26, 2027, moving the case roughly six months beyond the earlier October 2026 schedule.
The delay comes as Storm’s motion seeking to overturn his existing 2025 conviction on a money transmission count is still unresolved. He also continues to face separate money laundering and sanctions charges that were left undecided after the first jury failed to reach unanimous verdicts.
Defense request adopted over prosecutors’ timeline
Earlier in August, Storm’s lawyers asked Judge Katherine Failla to set any retrial for no earlier than April 2027, according to the court proceedings. Prosecutors opposed a longer delay and had argued for the case to remain on the earlier timetable.
The judge ultimately accepted the defense request and reset the schedule around an April 26, 2027 trial date. Other pretrial deadlines were also adjusted to match the new calendar.
Pretrial calendar shifts into early 2027
With the retrial moved back, expert disclosures are now scheduled for early 2027. The court has also set a final pretrial conference for April 20, 2027, six days before the retrial is due to begin.
The revised schedule marks a clear change from the timing prosecutors had sought months earlier. In March, prosecutors were pursuing an October retrial after the first trial ended without unanimous jury decisions on two of the counts.
Two charges remain unresolved
Storm still faces money laundering and sanctions charges, each of which carries a potential sentence of up to 20 years, according to the source article. The first jury deadlocked on both counts, while convicting him on a separate money transmission charge in 2025.
At the time prosecutors sought the earlier retrial, Storm said that another trial could leave him exposed to as much as 40 years in federal prison if he were convicted on both unresolved charges. He also said the first trial, which lasted four weeks, had heavily depleted his legal resources.
Acquittal bid could affect the case before retrial
Separate from the retrial schedule, Storm has a pending Rule 29 motion asking the court to overturn his existing conviction. Under that federal rule, a judge may enter a judgment of acquittal if the evidence presented at trial is legally insufficient to support the conviction.
That motion has not yet been resolved, leaving an important part of the case undecided even as the court prepares for a second trial on the remaining counts. The next confirmed steps are the early-2027 pretrial deadlines, the April 20 final pretrial conference, and the April 26, 2027 retrial date.
Source: crypto.news