The United States Department of Justice has charged Samourai Wallet founders Keonne Rodríguez and William Lonergan Hill with money laundering.
The United States has orchestrated a new attack against the crypto industry.
On Wednesday, the Department of Justice announced that the founders of Bitcoin wallet Samourai Wallet were arrested on charges of laundering several million dollars through their privacy-focused crypto wallet.
Keonne Rodriguez and William Lonergan Hill, founders of the Bitcoin wallet, are accused of committing conspiracy against the United States by enabling more than $2.000 billion in illegal transactions and facilitating the laundering of another $100 million in illicit funds. , as noted by the Department of Justice, in a Press release published on Wednesday.
At the time of writing this article, the site of Samourai Wallet is blocked, at the same time that it displays a message about the seizure measures that have been taken against US agencies.
Samourai Wallet founders charged with conspiracy and money laundering
Following the arrest and charges, Rodriguez and Lonergan Hill face up to 25 years in prison.
The crypto community has reacted to the measures implemented by the Department of Justice, pointing out the arrest of the founders of the Bitcoin wallet as an attack on financial privacy rights. Crypto investor Ryan Adams noted that this arrest is part of a message that the United States is sending to the crypto industry in general.
“No transaction will be private”, Adams wrote on his X account.
In addition to this, the crypto community is emphasizing that Samourai Wallet has been created as a Bitcoin wallet that allows for privacy options. However, the Department of Justice has labeled it as a cryptocurrency mixing service that threatens security and stability.
“As alleged, Keonne Rodríguez and William Lonergan Hill are responsible for developing, marketing and operating Samourai, a cryptocurrency mixing service that executed more than $2 billion in illegal transactions and served as a haven for criminals to engage in the “large scale money laundering”reads the Department's statement, which also noted that several of the operations carried out through the crypto wallet may be related to Silk Road and Hydra Market criminals.
A new attack on financial privacy
Udi Wertheimer, an NFT investor, has also spoken out against the new attack by the United States on the crypto industry. In his X account, the crypto investor stressed that privacy is "normal" and that cryptocurrencies, which have been in development for a decade and a half, should find a way to legally guarantee privacy to users.
“These developers face up to 25 years in prison for writing code”, said Adams in a separate tweet, contrasting with the measures implemented by the US government against the cryptocurrency mixing platform Tornado Cash.
Adams also emphasized that, according to United Nations (UN) statistics, traditional banks facilitate money laundering of at least $2 trillion, which represents about 20 times more than the Samourai Wallet figure. However, few bankers have been seen going to jail for this, she noted.
“They are making an example of cryptocurrencies because they don't want us to have private transactions between peers. Not passing laws in democratically elected chambers. Not issuing public guidelines. They just come to your house and take you.”, noted the expert, indicating that after the recent measures taken against the founders of Samourai Wallet and, previously, against the developers of Tornado Cash, the next could be the creators of Zcash, a blockchain and cryptocurrency that preserves the user privacy, and Aztec, an Ethereum-based Layer2 network that is also focused on the privacy of user operations. Adams stressed that regulators are not following actual laws and that these measures appear to be aimed at restricting the freedom to transact cryptocurrencies.
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