Crypto expert and Ethereum developer, Virgil Griffith, who gave a speech at a Pyongyang conference pleaded guilty to conspiring to aid North Korea in evading the US imposed sanctions.
Griffith worked as a senior researcher with the Ethereum Foundation admitted to violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act by aiding North Korea to set up crypto payment infrastructure aimed at evading the US sanctions in order to fund its nuclear weapons program.
Virgil Giffith Source: medium.com
The developer also tried to recruit other US citizens to provide similar services to North Korea.
The software expert confessed just before his trial that is scheduled to take place on January 18 next year. Griffith can get as much as 20 years in prison for "jeopardizing the national security of the United States" by undermining sanctions, however, prosecutors agreed to seek punishment in the range of 63 months to 78 months as part of the deal, Bloomberg reported.
Griffith participated in the Pyongyang Blockchain and Cryptocurrency Conference 2019 as a speaker and did a presentation about Blockchain and Peace.
He was arrested right after it.
I refuse to take the convenient path of throwing Virgil under the bus, because I firmly believe that that would be wrong. I'm signing. Reasoning below.https://t.co/E44p5caeJO
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) December 1, 2019
As soon as the news of the arrest broke, Ethereum cryptocurrency co-founder Vitalik Buterin published a petition to support of Griffith.
