5 Years In Prison For Building A Bitcoin Wallet | Lauren Rodriguez

**Lauren Rodriguez** (0:02)
Our home was at five in the morning, raided by the FBI. And there's laser sights on our chests, and we're handcuffed and separated. These are the prosecutors who brought charges, asked, do you think FinCEN, that Samurai Wallet is a money service business? And they had said emphatically, no, they're not because they don't take custody. They will lie, cheat, do whatever it takes.

**Danny Knowles** (0:25)
So they don't want the truth.

**Lauren Rodriguez** (0:27)
They're out to win. They're not out for truth, they're not out for justice, they're out to win. This case doesn't just affect us. It has broader implications for not only Bitcoin, but kind of developers as a whole. This did stifle innovation. This goes against Trump's executive orders. This goes against the Deputy AG's memo that they put out, violates them on some constitutional grounds. The war on crypto is not over. And at any point, this could resurface.

**Danny Knowles** (0:57)
LAUREN RODRIGUEZ Lauren.

**Lauren Rodriguez** (1:01)
Hi, Danny.

**Danny Knowles** (1:01)
Good to see you. Thank you for coming to Denver for this.

**Lauren Rodriguez** (1:04)
Thank you for having me on.

**Danny Knowles** (1:06)
There's some shows that you just know are really important shows to make. And this is definitely one of them. But you've obviously not been on the show before. Do you want to start off by just introducing yourself?

**Lauren Rodriguez** (1:17)
Sure. My name is Lauren Rodriguez, and I'm the wife of Keonne Rodriguez, who is currently serving a five-year federal prison sentence for developing a Bitcoin wallet called Samurai Wallet.

**Danny Knowles** (1:32)
So I have covered this case a little bit before Bill and Keonne actually went to jail. I had Bill's lawyer on the show, Zach Shapiro from BPI. But for anyone who maybe hasn't listened to that show, doesn't know what Samurai Wallet was, do you want to start by explaining?

**Lauren Rodriguez** (1:46)
Sure. So Samurai Wallet, as you said, was founded by Keonne, my husband and his partner and co-defendant, Bill, William Hill, in 2015 They started Samurai because at that time, there was definitely a maybe ethos transition within the Bitcoin space.
It was towards the end, dark while the wallet had kind of paused development. There was a real focus towards making Bitcoin that your grandma can use. And that just did not interest them. They were interested in the censorship-resistant promises of Bitcoin.

**Danny Knowles** (2:32)
They were cypherpunks.

**Lauren Rodriguez** (2:32)
Yeah. And so they started Samurai for themselves primarily. Said, you know, we're going to build a wallet for ourselves and everyone else is along for the ride. And what that meant is they definitely had a strong focus on privacy features within the wallet. It was a full-batch 32 wallet, but they had added features such as, you know, integrated tour, painims, let's see, cahoots.
There was a lot of them, Stonewall, Stonewall 2X, a lot of interesting features, like type change outputs and various things. And then there were two features that is what the government took issue with, which were Ricochet, which added extra hops to transactions all within a user's wallet, but to separate where the funds came from to where they were going. And then Whirlpool, which was their CoinJoin implementation. So they operated Samurai for almost 10 years, no problems on Google Play Store, had a lot of users, a lot of core support, and never had any interaction, never any requests for information from law enforcement, of any, in any sense. They even helped fund a letter in response to a proposed legislation from FinCEN, along with 25 other companies that signed this. So they were out there operating the business. And then on April 24th of 2024, our home was at five in the morning, raided by the FBI and the IRS. And at the same time, Bill in Portugal, there was a coordinated raid on him and his wife's house. Again, first, first interaction with law enforcement, we never received a, you know, notice of investigation or a, you know, letter saying, don't, don't destroy anything. This was our first encounter with, was a light rising up to our window at five in the morning and our dog barking and, you know, us waking up and realizing there's people surrounding our house. And, you know, here come, come out with your hands raised and the action of, you know, trying to throw on slippers and a robe and cause it was cold and get on the stairs and Keonne is just in shorts and I'm trying to leash our dog because, you know, as the meme goes, ATF agents or government agents like to shoot dogs. So that was a big concern of mine. And we go outside and there's laser sights on our chests and we're handcuffed and separated. And I watch, you know, 40 armed tactical gear, night vision, you know, nods. Well, firstly, flew a drone into the house and then continued to clear our house about 40 agents. This is a small two-bedroom cottage and I'm standing in the street, you know, handcuffed watching it happen and not understanding what was going on.