In a letter to the Southern District of New York (SDNY) filed at this time, the prosecutors within the Samourai Wallet case acknowledged that they didn’t withhold exculpatory proof and petitioned the choose for the case to disclaim the protection’s request for a listening to to debate the late disclosure of key data that prosecutors had obtained from FinCEN virtually two years in the past.
Earlier within the week, the protection acknowledged in a letter that they’d discovered that FinCEN had “strongly suggested” that Samourai Wallet was not performing as a cash transmitting enterprise because of the noncustodial nature of the product in a dialogue between sure FinCEN members (extra on these members two sections down) and the prosecutors on August 23, 2023.
This data got here to gentle because of a Brady movement that the protection had submitted. (One of these movement is known as after the Brady v. Maryland Supreme Court docket case, which passed off in 1963. The case established the Brady rule, which stipulates that exculpatory proof be supplied to the protection in order that it may be utilized as part of due course of.)
On condition that one of many two expenses the Samourai builders are going through is conspiracy to function an unlicensed cash transmitting enterprise, some felt that this new data coming to gentle might be grounds for dismissing the case.
No Dismissal, No Listening to
Nonetheless, at this time’s letter from the prosecutors states that they don’t have any intention of dropping the case, nor do they really feel that the listening to requested by the protection is warranted.
“There is no basis for a hearing, nor is there anything to remedy: the disclosure itself shows that the government has not violated Brady,” the prosecutors acknowledged within the letter. “The Government disclosed all known substantive communications between the prosecution team and FinCEN months in advance of pretrial motions and trial.”
The prosecutors added that they plan to proceed with the case, highlighting the second cost: conspiracy to commit cash laundering.
“As alleged, Samourai laundered over $100 million dollars of crime proceeds originating from, among other criminal sources: illegal darkweb markets, such as Silk Road and Hydra Market; various wired fraud and computer fraud schemes that deprived victims of funds, including web-server intrusion, a spear phishing scheme, and schemes to defraud multiple decentralized finance protocols; and other illegal activities,” the prosecutors wrote.
Downplaying The Input From FinCEN
Moreover, the prosecutors claimed that the truth that they solely just lately disclosed their communications with FinCEN is irrelevant to the case, as a lot of the charged conduct doesn’t depend on FinCEN rules.
They additionally downplayed the significance of what was shared by the FinCEN staff who spoke with the prosecutors: Kevin O’Conner (Chief of FinCEN’s Digital Belongings and Rising Expertise Part within the Enforcement and Compliance Division) and Lorena Valente (an worker of FinCEN’s Coverage Division when she spoke with the prosecution).
The prosecutors referred to O’Conner and Valente’s opinions as “individual, informal, and caveated,” including that that they had already supplied “substantive email correspondence between the prosecution team and members of FinCEN relating to the August 23, 2023 call.”
They went on to state that “the individual employees of FinCEN were not speaking on behalf of FinCEN, they were not providing FinCEN’s opinion, and they ‘did not have a sense of what FinCEN would decide if this question were presented to their FinCEN policy committee.’”
No Brady Violation
In the ultimate part of the letter, the prosecutors asserted that that they had not violated authorized norms in not providing sure particulars of their August 23, 2023 name with FinCEN till this level within the pre-trial course of.
“The record shows that there was no Brady violation in this case,” wrote the prosecutors.
“The government disclosed the contents of this informal conversation to the defense in advance of pretrial motions, and approximately seven months in advance of trial in response to a request for that information,” they added. “Nothing more is required.”
Lastly, based on a Second Circuit ruling, which the prosecutors additionally talked about within the letter, so long as the protection possesses Brady proof in time for its efficient use, the federal government has not disadvantaged the protection of due course of.
What Comes Subsequent?
It’s unclear as to when Choose Berman will reply to at this time’s letter from the prosecution.
The protection’s opening movement was initially scheduled for at this time however has been pushed again two weeks. One week after the opening movement, the prosecution will reply to the protection’s opening movement.
As of the final pre-trial listening to, the prosecution is scheduled to supply its professional disclosure on July 15, 2025, and the protection is anticipated to supply theirs by August 8, 2025.
The trial is scheduled to start on November 3, 2025.
In case you’d prefer to donate to the protection fund for the Samourai builders, you are able to do so through the P2P Rights Fund.
