Samourai co-founder's prison transfer saga hits a new stop after 30-day hell ride 🚐

Keonne Rodriguez, co-founder of Samourai Wallet, faces yet another prison transfer after the drug treatment program at FCI McKean was deactivated, he said Wednesday. Rodriguez wrote on X that McKean's warden informed program participants that Rodriguez and 70 other inmates would be moved to facilities where treatment remains available. He had entered the program because completing it could reduce his five-year sentence by up to a year.

In a letter published by The Rage, Rodriguez described his earlier journey from FPC Morgantown to McKean as "the absolute worst 30 days" of his life. He said his request to make the roughly four-hour trip himself was denied. According to Rodriguez, inmates leaving Morgantown were placed in ankle shackles and handcuffs attached to waist chains before being bused to an airport and flown to the Federal Transfer Center in Oklahoma City. At the facility, he was held with prisoners from different security classifications and spent most of his time locked in a cell. Rodriguez wrote that he wondered whether "all the circles of hell" were contained within the federal transfer facility. He was eventually assigned a cell with an inmate serving a murder sentence and was given only part of a foam mattress, leaving part of his body resting on a metal bunk overnight.

Rodriguez is serving a five-year sentence after pleading guilty to conspiring to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business. The Justice Department said he and Samourai co-founder William Lonergan Hill transmitted more than $237 million in criminal proceeds through the service.

His case unfolded alongside congressional efforts to protect software developers who do not control user assets from being classified as financial intermediaries. The latest Senate CLARITY Act draft retained Blockchain Regulatory Certainty Act provisions shielding non-controlling developers from certain Bank Secrecy Act money-transmission requirements. The Senate failed to advance the CLARITY Act on Sept. 15 after a procedural vote fell short of the 60 votes needed to move the legislation forward.