Clark Smith Villazor LLP Obtains A Complete Dismissal of $722 Million Fraud Charges Against Client

July 29, 2026

On July 27, 2026, Rodney Villazor, along with co-counsel at Kobre & Kim, obtained a dismissal with prejudice of all criminal charges against client Matthew Goettsche ending a seven-year long federal prosecution in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey.  In December 2019, Mr. Goettsche and others from the BitClub Network (BCN), were indicted on wire fraud conspiracy and selling unregistered securities.  The core of the government's allegations were that he and the co-conspirators created a fraudulent scheme to fake "bitcoin mining earnings" from purported mining pools.  However, as set forth fully in a motion to dismiss, CSV and Kobre & Kim exposed the fundamental weaknesses in the government's evidence through its own investigation.  The defense team established that BCN spent hundreds of millions in purchasing mining equipment, successfully ran numerous cryptocurrency mining pools which were all verifiable on the public blockchain, and distributed over $800 million in cryptocurrency mining and commissions to BCN customers.  The DOJ did not dispute or challenge this evidence and subsequently moved to dismiss the criminal charges with prejudice.