Samourai Wallet says feds hid advice that crypto mixer was in the clear

By: bitcoin ethereum news|2025/05/07 00:30:04
0
Share
copy
Samourai Wallet’s lawyers allege federal prosecutors suppressed advice that the firm didn’t need a license before they charged executives at the crypto mixing service months later. In a May 5 letter to a Manhattan federal court, lawyers for Samourai co-founders Keonne Rodriguez and William Hill said prosecutors disclosed that the US Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) representatives told them six months before they charged the pair “that under FinCEN’s guidance, the Samourai Wallet app would not qualify as a ‘Money Services Business’ requiring a FinCEN license.” “Shockingly, six months later, the same prosecutors criminally charged Keonne Rodriguez and William Hill with operating just such a business without a FinCEN license,” the lawyers added. The letter claimed that prosecutors were required to share their discussions with FinCEN over Samourai two weeks after they unsealed charges, making the deadline May 8 last year, but instead “suppressed this information for over a year, disclosing it only on April 1, 2025.” Prosecutors charged Samourai CEO Rodriguez and its technology chief Hill with conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business and money laundering conspiracy in February 2024, unsealing the charges and arresting the pair in April that year. Samourai’s mixing service took crypto from multiple users and blended it together to hide its origins. The government alleged the platform helped with over $2 billion in illegal transactions and facilitated over $100 million worth of money laundering transactions from online black markets and scammers. Rodriguez and Hill both pleaded not guilty. In the letter, their lawyers said prosecutors shared details of a call with Kevin O’Connor, chief of FinCEN’s Virtual Assets and Emerging Technology Section in the Enforcement and Compliance Division, and Policy Division staffer Lorena Valente. According to an email from one of the prosecutors summarizing the call, FinCEN said that “because Samourai does not take ‘custody’ of the cryptocurrency by possessing the private keys to any addresses where the cryptocurrency is stored, that would strongly suggest that Samourai is NOT acting as an MSB [money services business].” The email said O’Connor and Valente agreed that the government could try to argue that Samourai functionally controlled the crypto, “but that has never been addressed in the guidance, and so it could be a difficult argument” for prosecutors. Samourai’s lawyers asked the court for a hearing “to determine the circumstances surrounding the Government’s late disclosure” and to administer a remedy. Samourai to renew dismissal bid if case goes on Rodriguez and Hill’s lawyers said that, using this latest information, they would again ask for the charges to be dismissed, arguing they lacked fair notice and “understood they were acting lawfully.” Related: US Treasury’s OFAC can’t restore Tornado Cash sanctions, judge rules Prosecutors and Samourai asked the court for more time on April 28 to consider potentially dismissing the case after the Justice Department rolled back its crypto enforcement. Rodriguez and Hill bid to dismiss the case in early April, arguing it should be dropped as Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said in an April 7 memo that the Justice Department wouldn’t prosecute crypto mixers for “unwitting violations of regulations.” In the latest letter, their lawyers said if the government “were to resist the Blanche Memo’s directive and push forward,” then they would bid to dismiss as “if they were not money transmitters under FinCEN’s guidance, then they could not possibly be prosecuted for not having a license.” Magazine: Tornado Cash 2.0 — The race to build safe and legal coin mixers Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/samourai-wallet-feds-hid-advice-crypto-mixer-didnt-need-license?utm_source=rss_feed&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=rss_partner_inbound

You may also like

Uniswap is trapped in an innovation dilemma

The various iterations of Uniswap are one of the sources of vitality in the DeFi market, but since 2023, Uniswap has not proposed any substantial innovations, instead adhering to traditional business explorations in application chains, Launchpads, etc., leading to a slump in token prices and market ...

What is the key to competition in crypto banking?

Digital banks, crypto cards, wallets, super apps, and DeFi protocols are all converging towards the same goal: to become the primary gateway for your savings, spending, earning, and transferring in the new era.

The flow of stablecoins and the spillover effects in the foreign exchange market

Research has found that an exogenous increase in net inflows of stablecoins significantly widens the price deviation between stablecoins and traditional foreign exchange, leads to depreciation of the local currency, and worsens the financing conditions for synthetic dollars (i.e., increases the doll...

After two years, Hong Kong's first batch of stablecoin licenses finally issued: HSBC, Standard Chartered make the cut

The regulated entity is set to launch a stablecoin in the first half of this year.

The person who helped TAO rise by 90% has now single-handedly crashed the price again today

As long as people are around, the story continues. But once they're gone, you may not even find a worthy opponent to play against.

3-Minute Guide to Participating in the SpaceX IPO on Bitget

Bitget IPO Prime brings a rare opportunity for global users to participate in world-class unicorn IPOs, allowing ordinary users to equally access the potential economic benefits of top-tier IPOs.

Popular coins

Latest Crypto News