In the United States, a Manhattan federal court declared a mistrial in the high-profile case of two MIT graduate brothers accused of stealing $25 million in cryptocurrency in 12 seconds through complex transaction manipulation on the Ethereum network. After three days of intense deliberations, the jury was unable to reach a unanimous verdict, with some reporting severe emotional burnout and insomnia.
Prosecutors alleged that the brothers “poisoned” a block of transactions, replacing data and gaining the ability to interfere with the victims’ trades, which constitutes fraud and money laundering. The defense, however, argued that this was a legal, albeit aggressive, strategy in the highly competitive trading bot environment, and that the defendants’ actions constituted “innovation, not crime.”
The case is already being called a landmark case for the development of legal practice regarding complex attacks and manipulations in DeFi and at the protocol level. The US Department of Justice has not yet decided whether to retry the case, but the outcome of the new trial could have significant implications for law enforcement in the decentralized finance space.