Coin Center Files Brief in MEV Bot Case after Prosecutors’ Opposition

Cryptocurrency advocacy group CoinCenter reviewed the ongoing criminal trial of two brothers who allegedly exploited the Ethereum blockchain using Maximum Extractable Value (MEV) bots.

In Monday’s amicus curiae brief, filed by an entity not party to the case, Coin Center disputed one of the prosecution’s key theories of the case regarding Anton and James Perere-Bueno. The two are believed to be responsible for a $25 million worth of MEV exploit that occurred in April 2023.

According to Coin Center, the U.S. government’s “good faith verification” claim is baseless and should be rejected by the courts.

“‘Good faith verification’ in the crypto community is a mathematical check rather than a legal or normative determination, and defendants do not appear to have violated any clear rules or controls found within the Ethereum protocol in a manner that would merit outside interference or enforcement,” CoinCenter said, adding:

“[T]He is asking the court to force prosecutors to impose novel and alien codes of conduct on top of the Protocol’s rules, in a manner that is not only unwarranted but also harmful to the government through criminal prosecution. ”

The court brief, filed on the 14th day of the Perer Buenos’ criminal trial, came amid objections from U.S. prosecutors who argued that Coin Center would use policy arguments rather than legal arguments to urge the jury to acquit the two brothers.

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Various theories about the $25 million case

At the heart of this incident is an MEV bot exploit that occurs when validators manipulate the order of transactions within a block to maximize revenue. The outcome of this lawsuit could have significant implications among crypto traders and platforms.

Lawyers for the U.S. government said Wednesday that they plan to argue that “defendants falsely pretended to be honest verifiers,” according to a report from the courtroom by Inner City Press.[s]” exploit.

“‘Honest’ verification within the Ethereum ecosystem simply means following certain consensus rules articulated in the protocol software,” the Coin Center overview states. “[A]Adopting the prosecutor’s “honest validator” fraud theory would be alien to widespread industry practice and violate long-standing legal principles of harmless harm and fair notice. ”

According to reports, the defense called this theory a “nonsense argument” and argued in opening arguments that “the victim here was a sandwich bot.”