US judge denies brothers' motion to dismiss $25 million crypto fraud charges

PANews reported on July 24 that according to Cointelegraph, U.S. District Judge Jessica Clarke rejected the motion of the Peraire-Bueno brothers, MIT graduates, to dismiss the $25 million cryptocurrency fraud charges. Prosecutors accused the brothers of exploiting a vulnerability in the Ethereum network in May 2024 to conduct arbitrage attacks by manipulating the MEV robot. Court documents show that the two developed a four-step plan of "bait-blocking-search-propagation", using 16 Ethereum verification nodes and 529.5 ETH as bait to intercept the trading profits of the MEV robot within 12 seconds. The judge determined that his actions met the requirements of wire fraud, although the defendant argued that "the system code allows such operations."

The case is expected to go to trial in October 2025, and the brothers face felony charges such as wire fraud and conspiracy to launder money. The prosecutor has dropped one of the charges of conspiracy to receive stolen property, but the remaining charges will still go to trial.