The co-founders of a cryptocurrency mixing service called Samourai Wallet — which makes crypto transactions anonymous — have been arrested and charged with money laundering, according to an indictment unsealed Wednesday.
Prosecutors in the Southern District of New York claimed the crypto mixer made $2 billion in transactions untraceable and that its founders – Keonne Rodriguez and William Lonergan Hill – knew criminals were using the service to launder funds.
Rodriguez and Hill were charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business.
The Samourai Wallet website has been seized. Rodriguez and Hill were arrested Wednesday and the United States will seek Hill’s extradition from Portugal to stand trial, according to a news release.
About $100 million of the transactions executed by Samourai Wallet came from “illegal dark web marketplaces, such as Silk Road and Hydra Market” – as well as various online schemes and other illegal activities, prosecutors alleged in the filing. ‘charge.
And Rodriguez and Hill were well aware of it, prosecutors said. They “openly invited users to launder the proceeds of crime” publicly on X, in DMs and in marketing materials forwarded to potential investors, according to the indictment.
Rodriguez was the CEO of Samourai and Hill was its CTO. They founded the company in 2015, according to the indictment, and the app has been downloaded more than 100,000 times. In total, this earned them $4.5 million in transaction fees, according to the indictment.
“The FBI is committed to exposing secret financial schemes and ensuring that no one can hide behind a screen to perpetuate financial wrongdoing,” FBI Deputy Director James Smith said in a statement.
No attorneys were listed for Rodriguez or Hill and an attorney who has represented their companies in the past did not immediately respond to Business Insider’s request for comment. If convicted, they each face a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison.
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