Keonne Rodriguez, co-founder of the shuttered Bitcoin privacy app Samourai Wallet, has appealed from federal prison for community donations to help cover more than $2 million in legal debt, saying hopes for a presidential pardon have largely faded. Rodriguez, 37, is five months into a 60-month sentence at FPC Morgantown in West Virginia.
Appeal From Prison Cites Mounting Legal Bills
In a May 6 post on X, Rodriguez said he and his wife have exhausted options as attorneys press for payment and the U.S. Department of Justice seeks to begin collecting a $250,000 court-ordered fine. He directed donations to the Bitcoin address bc1qtjjcvn98wh7dfd55m8kxhjcfexanttwt8gtan8 and noted that private arrangements could be made via his wife’s X account. At publication time, the address showed roughly $65,000 in contributions.
Case Background and Sentencing
Rodriguez was arrested in April 2024 and, alongside co-founder William Lonergan Hill, pleaded guilty in July 2025 to conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. He was sentenced in November 2025 to five years in prison; Hill received a four-year sentence. As part of the judgment, the founders agreed to forfeit approximately $6.37 million in fees tied to Samourai’s operations.
Prosecutors alleged the company’s non-custodial tools — including the Whirlpool mixing service and Ricochet “hop” feature — were marketed and used to obscure transaction provenance, facilitating criminal activity. Samourai Wallet, launched in 2015, served more than 100,000 users and processed over $2 billion in Bitcoin transactions, according to the DOJ. Rodriguez previously told journalist Natalie Brunell in December 2025, per press reports, that he accepted a plea deal to avoid the risk of a longer sentence and substantially higher legal costs at trial.
Pardon Hopes Diminish
Rodriguez acknowledged that expectations of clemency have waned despite public discussion of his case in late 2025. “One must come to terms with the fact that I am simply a federal prisoner without money, power, or influence, and I will serve my full sentence,” he wrote. A petition urging a pardon had gathered about 15,955 signatures as of May 7, according to Cryip.co.
Privacy, Open-Source Development, and Legal Risk
The Samourai prosecution has intensified debate over the liability of developers who build non-custodial privacy tools. Civil liberties advocates, including the Cato Institute, have warned that such cases could chill open-source development and financial privacy work. Following Samourai’s shutdown, its codebase continued to circulate via Ashigaru, an independently maintained fork.
In earlier comments, Rodriguez cautioned that if the legal reasoning in his case is extended, Bitcoin miners and other infrastructure providers could face future money-transmission enforcement risks. The outcome continues to shape how developers, attorneys, and regulators assess the boundary between publishing privacy-preserving software and operating regulated financial services under U.S. law.