Keonne Rodriguez, co-founder of the Bitcoin privacy platform Samourai Wallet, has been sentenced to five years in federal prison and fined $250,000 for operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business. The decision, delivered on November 6, 2025, by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, marks a major development in the U.S. government’s ongoing enforcement campaign against cryptocurrency privacy tools.
Key Developments
- •Rodriguez received the maximum five-year prison sentence and a $250,000 fine.
- •He and co-founder William Lonergan Hill admitted to conspiracy charges in July to avoid longer money-laundering sentences.
- •Prosecutors stated that Samourai Wallet facilitated over $237 million in illicit transactions.
- •This case underscores an intensifying U.S. crackdown on crypto privacy services, following similar actions against Tornado Cash’s Roman Storm.
Details of the Sentencing
Prosecutors alleged that Samourai Wallet’s core privacy features, including its CoinJoin transaction mixing and Ricochet tools, were deliberately designed to obscure the origin of funds and enable money laundering. According to the Justice Department, users laundered at least $237 million in illicit proceeds through the platform.
Rodriguez’s guilty plea earlier this year reduced his potential sentence from decades in prison to five years, the statutory maximum for conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business. Alongside the prison term, the court imposed joint forfeiture of $237 million and restitution exceeding $6 million, to be shared between Rodriguez and Hill.
Co-Founder Awaits Sentencing
Rodriguez’s partner, William Lonergan Hill, who was also charged in the same conspiracy, is scheduled to be sentenced on November 19, 2025. Both defendants previously admitted to violating U.S. financial regulations by offering transaction-mixing services without obtaining the necessary federal licenses.
The Department of Justice emphasized that Samourai Wallet “knowingly facilitated criminal use of its platform,” adding that its operators marketed the app specifically for users seeking to hide illegal transactions.
Broader Crackdown on Crypto Privacy Tools
Rodriguez’s sentencing comes as part of a broader U.S. enforcement wave targeting privacy-focused crypto platforms, reflecting regulators’ growing discomfort with the sector’s anonymity features.
Just weeks earlier, Roman Storm, co-developer of the Tornado Cash protocol, was convicted on similar grounds, marking another high-profile win for federal prosecutors. Regulators argue that unlicensed crypto-mixing and privacy applications undermine anti-money-laundering (AML) frameworks and facilitate the movement of illicit funds across borders.
Legal experts say these rulings could have a chilling effect on privacy innovation within the blockchain industry. Developers of privacy-enhancing protocols may now face heightened scrutiny and potential liability for how their code is used.
Conclusion
With Rodriguez now sentenced and Hill awaiting his own hearing, the Samourai Wallet case serves as a landmark in the U.S. government’s effort to tighten oversight on decentralized privacy tools.
It signals a future in which developers of non-compliant crypto services may face direct criminal accountability, reshaping the boundaries between financial privacy and regulatory compliance in digital finance.