Southern District of New York Founders Of Samourai Wallet Cryptocurrency Mixing Service Plead Guilty United States Department of Justice
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ppAttorney for the United States Acting Under Authority Conferred by 28 USC 515 Nicolas Roos Special Agent in Charge of the New York Field Office of Internal Revenue ServiceCriminal Investigation IRSCI Harry T Chavis Jr and Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation FBI Christopher G Raia announced today the guilty pleas of KEONNE RODRIGUEZ and WILLIAM LONERGAN HILL the cofounders of Samourai Wallet Samourai a cryptocurrency mixer that facilitated more than 200 million in illegal transactions RODRIGUEZ the Chief Executive Officer of Samourai and HILL the Chief Technology Officer pled guilty to participating in a conspiracy to operate a money transmitting business that transmitted crime proceeds from among other things illegal dark web markets cyber intrusions a spear phishing scheme and schemes to defraud multiple decentralized finance protocols RODRIGUEZ and HILL pled guilty on July 30 2025 before US District Judge Denise L Cote ppThe defendants created and operated a cryptocurrency mixing service that they knew enabled criminals to wash millions in dirty money including proceeds from cryptocurrency thefts drug trafficking operations and fraud schemes said Attorney for the United States Nicolas Roos When criminals exploit cryptocurrency technology for illicit purposes it undermines the public trust and unfairly burdens legitimate cryptocurrency companies that are committed to operating lawfully This Office and our partner agencies are committed to holding accountable those who exploit emerging technologies to launder crime proceeds ppRodriguez and Hill admitted to operating a money transmitting business that transmitted crime proceeds essentially washing more than 200 million in dirty money for criminals said Special Agent in Charge of IRSCI Harry T Chavis Jr They did not just facilitate this illicit movement of money but also encouraged it Special Agents with IRSCI New York and IRSCI LAs Cyber units worked with our federal and international law enforcement partners in this investigation that detailed the companys clear disregard for the rule of law Even with all the washing in this scheme no one was clean in these transactionsppKeonne Rodriguez and William Hills guilty pleas prove their cryptocurrency mixing serviceSamourai Walletwas designed to conceal criminal financial transactions and launder millions of dollars of dirty money said FBI Assistant Director in Charge Christopher G Raia The FBI is committed to bringing to justice anyone who uses technological innovation to facilitate illicit activityppAccording to court documents and admissionsppBeginning around 2015 RODRIGUEZ and HILL began developing Samourai a mobile application that was designed and operated as a service for transmitting criminal proceeds The defendants engineered Samourai around two services specifically intended to conceal the nature of illicit transactions The first a Bitcoin mixing service known as Whirlpool coordinated batches of Bitcoin exchanges between groups of Samourai users Through this process the original source of particular Bitcoin holdings became obscured within the blockchains transactional record effectively preventing law enforcement agencies and cryptocurrency exchanges from tracing funds back to their origins The second service called Ricochet enabled users to introduce additional and unnecessary intermediate transactionsknown as hopsbetween sending and receiving addresses This feature served a similar obfuscation purpose making it substantially more difficult for monitoring entities to establish connections between cryptocurrency transfers and potential illicit activities The scale of these operations proved considerable from Ricochets launch in 2017 and Whirlpools inception in 2019 more than 80000 Bitcoinvalued at over 2 billion when calculated using contemporaneous exchange ratespassed through these services Samourai collected a fee for both services estimated to be over 6 million in revenue based on Bitcoins value at the time each fee was earnedppppRODRIGUEZ and HILL actively promoted Samourais utility for concealing criminal proceeds Their communications reveal a clear understanding of Samourais illegal applications In a WhatsApp exchange when asked to explain the concept of mixing RODRIGUEZ described the process as money laundering for bitcoin HILL similarly marketed Samourai as a transmittal service for criminal proceeds on Dread a darknet forum dedicated to discussing illegal marketplace activities In one exchange on that platform a user asked about the most secure methods to clean dirty BTC to make it untraceable clean and ensure the user would never get caught HILL responded by writing that Samourai Whirlpool is a much better option than a competitor service to clean dirty BTC The defendants own marketing materials acknowledged that customers would include DarkGrey Market participants moving proceeds from illicit activityppThe defendants conduct extended beyond passive facilitation to active encouragement of criminal activity In June and July 2020 RODRIGUEZ and HILL tracked in real time the flow of crime proceeds from a widely publicized hack of a prominent social media platform Rather than reporting the criminal activity or attempting to stop it both defendants publicly and privately expressed their intent and desire that the hackers use Samourais Whirlpool service to move the crime proceeds of the hack That encouragement included a July 16 2020 Twitter exchange after a third party encouraged the lovely hackers of the social media platform to use SamouraiWallet whirlpool to mix out once you are done collecting or decide to take profits in order to protect you from being found RODRIGUEZ responded by personally encouraging the hackers to feed and send the crime proceeds into Samourais Whirlpool When the hackers used a different cryptocurrency mixing service to launder the proceeds of the hack RODRIGUEZ and HILL expressed their disappointment on social mediapp ppRODRIGUEZ 36 of Harmony Pennsylvania and HILL 67 a US national who was arrested in Portugal each pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to operate a money transmitting business knowing the business transmitted crime proceeds which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison As part of their plea agreements with the Government RODRIGUEZ and HILL agreed to forfeit 23783236055ppThe maximum potential sentence in this case is prescribed by Congress and provided here for informational purposes only as any sentencing of the defendants will be determined by the judgeppMr Roos praised the investigative work of IRSCI and the FBI He also acknowledged the assistance of the Justice Departments Office of International Affairs Europol the Portuguese Judicial Police the ProcuradoriaGeral da República the Icelandic Police and the FBI Field Office in Pittsburgh for their assistance in the investigation of this caseppThe Justice Departments Office of International Affairs provided substantial assistance to secure the July 2024 extradition from Portugal of HILLppThis case is being handled by the Offices Complex Frauds and Cybercrime Unit and Illicit Finance and Money Laundering Unit Assistant US Attorneys Andrew K Chan David R Felton and Cecilia Vogel are in charge of the prosecution ppNicholas Biase Shelby Wratchford212 6372600ppAttorney for the United States Acting Under Authority Conferred by 28 USC 515 Amanda Houle announced that CHARLIE JAVICE was sentenced today to 85 months in prison for falselyppUnited States Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jay Clayton announced that MICHAEL PALLESCHI the former chairman and Chief Executive Officer of FTE Networks Inc FTE was sentencedppUnited States Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jay Clayton and Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation FBIppSouthern District of New York26 Federal Plaza 37th FloorNew York NY 10278pp ppMain Office Criminal Division 212 6372200ppppHave a question about Government Servicesp
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ppAttorney for the United States Acting Under Authority Conferred by 28 USC 515 Nicolas Roos Special Agent in Charge of the New York Field Office of Internal Revenue ServiceCriminal Investigation IRSCI Harry T Chavis Jr and Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation FBI Christopher G Raia announced today the guilty pleas of KEONNE RODRIGUEZ and WILLIAM LONERGAN HILL the cofounders of Samourai Wallet Samourai a cryptocurrency mixer that facilitated more than 200 million in illegal transactions RODRIGUEZ the Chief Executive Officer of Samourai and HILL the Chief Technology Officer pled guilty to participating in a conspiracy to operate a money transmitting business that transmitted crime proceeds from among other things illegal dark web markets cyber intrusions a spear phishing scheme and schemes to defraud multiple decentralized finance protocols RODRIGUEZ and HILL pled guilty on July 30 2025 before US District Judge Denise L Cote ppThe defendants created and operated a cryptocurrency mixing service that they knew enabled criminals to wash millions in dirty money including proceeds from cryptocurrency thefts drug trafficking operations and fraud schemes said Attorney for the United States Nicolas Roos When criminals exploit cryptocurrency technology for illicit purposes it undermines the public trust and unfairly burdens legitimate cryptocurrency companies that are committed to operating lawfully This Office and our partner agencies are committed to holding accountable those who exploit emerging technologies to launder crime proceeds ppRodriguez and Hill admitted to operating a money transmitting business that transmitted crime proceeds essentially washing more than 200 million in dirty money for criminals said Special Agent in Charge of IRSCI Harry T Chavis Jr They did not just facilitate this illicit movement of money but also encouraged it Special Agents with IRSCI New York and IRSCI LAs Cyber units worked with our federal and international law enforcement partners in this investigation that detailed the companys clear disregard for the rule of law Even with all the washing in this scheme no one was clean in these transactionsppKeonne Rodriguez and William Hills guilty pleas prove their cryptocurrency mixing serviceSamourai Walletwas designed to conceal criminal financial transactions and launder millions of dollars of dirty money said FBI Assistant Director in Charge Christopher G Raia The FBI is committed to bringing to justice anyone who uses technological innovation to facilitate illicit activityppAccording to court documents and admissionsppBeginning around 2015 RODRIGUEZ and HILL began developing Samourai a mobile application that was designed and operated as a service for transmitting criminal proceeds The defendants engineered Samourai around two services specifically intended to conceal the nature of illicit transactions The first a Bitcoin mixing service known as Whirlpool coordinated batches of Bitcoin exchanges between groups of Samourai users Through this process the original source of particular Bitcoin holdings became obscured within the blockchains transactional record effectively preventing law enforcement agencies and cryptocurrency exchanges from tracing funds back to their origins The second service called Ricochet enabled users to introduce additional and unnecessary intermediate transactionsknown as hopsbetween sending and receiving addresses This feature served a similar obfuscation purpose making it substantially more difficult for monitoring entities to establish connections between cryptocurrency transfers and potential illicit activities The scale of these operations proved considerable from Ricochets launch in 2017 and Whirlpools inception in 2019 more than 80000 Bitcoinvalued at over 2 billion when calculated using contemporaneous exchange ratespassed through these services Samourai collected a fee for both services estimated to be over 6 million in revenue based on Bitcoins value at the time each fee was earnedppppRODRIGUEZ and HILL actively promoted Samourais utility for concealing criminal proceeds Their communications reveal a clear understanding of Samourais illegal applications In a WhatsApp exchange when asked to explain the concept of mixing RODRIGUEZ described the process as money laundering for bitcoin HILL similarly marketed Samourai as a transmittal service for criminal proceeds on Dread a darknet forum dedicated to discussing illegal marketplace activities In one exchange on that platform a user asked about the most secure methods to clean dirty BTC to make it untraceable clean and ensure the user would never get caught HILL responded by writing that Samourai Whirlpool is a much better option than a competitor service to clean dirty BTC The defendants own marketing materials acknowledged that customers would include DarkGrey Market participants moving proceeds from illicit activityppThe defendants conduct extended beyond passive facilitation to active encouragement of criminal activity In June and July 2020 RODRIGUEZ and HILL tracked in real time the flow of crime proceeds from a widely publicized hack of a prominent social media platform Rather than reporting the criminal activity or attempting to stop it both defendants publicly and privately expressed their intent and desire that the hackers use Samourais Whirlpool service to move the crime proceeds of the hack That encouragement included a July 16 2020 Twitter exchange after a third party encouraged the lovely hackers of the social media platform to use SamouraiWallet whirlpool to mix out once you are done collecting or decide to take profits in order to protect you from being found RODRIGUEZ responded by personally encouraging the hackers to feed and send the crime proceeds into Samourais Whirlpool When the hackers used a different cryptocurrency mixing service to launder the proceeds of the hack RODRIGUEZ and HILL expressed their disappointment on social mediapp ppRODRIGUEZ 36 of Harmony Pennsylvania and HILL 67 a US national who was arrested in Portugal each pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to operate a money transmitting business knowing the business transmitted crime proceeds which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison As part of their plea agreements with the Government RODRIGUEZ and HILL agreed to forfeit 23783236055ppThe maximum potential sentence in this case is prescribed by Congress and provided here for informational purposes only as any sentencing of the defendants will be determined by the judgeppMr Roos praised the investigative work of IRSCI and the FBI He also acknowledged the assistance of the Justice Departments Office of International Affairs Europol the Portuguese Judicial Police the ProcuradoriaGeral da República the Icelandic Police and the FBI Field Office in Pittsburgh for their assistance in the investigation of this caseppThe Justice Departments Office of International Affairs provided substantial assistance to secure the July 2024 extradition from Portugal of HILLppThis case is being handled by the Offices Complex Frauds and Cybercrime Unit and Illicit Finance and Money Laundering Unit Assistant US Attorneys Andrew K Chan David R Felton and Cecilia Vogel are in charge of the prosecution ppNicholas Biase Shelby Wratchford212 6372600ppAttorney for the United States Acting Under Authority Conferred by 28 USC 515 Amanda Houle announced that CHARLIE JAVICE was sentenced today to 85 months in prison for falselyppUnited States Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jay Clayton announced that MICHAEL PALLESCHI the former chairman and Chief Executive Officer of FTE Networks Inc FTE was sentencedppUnited States Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jay Clayton and Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation FBIppSouthern District of New York26 Federal Plaza 37th FloorNew York NY 10278pp ppMain Office Criminal Division 212 6372200ppppHave a question about Government Servicesp
