Usman Salis
Ripple's top tech guy David Schwartz just spilled some serious tea about what's really happening to Bitcoin legend Roger Ver. According to Schwartz, the whole situation is way darker than anyone realizes, and Ver has been getting screwed over by the feds for years. The Ripple (XRP) exec didn't hold back when he called out what looks like a total hit job on one of crypto's founding fathers.
Why Ripple (XRP)'s CTO Says Roger Ver Got Royally Screwed
David Schwartz, who runs the tech side at Ripple (XRP), just went off about how the U.S. government has been treating Roger Ver like garbage for years. We're talking about the guy who literally got nicknamed "Bitcoin Jesus" because he was pushing Bitcoin (BTC) when most people thought it was just internet funny money.
Schwartz basically said Ver didn't just wake up one day and decide to ditch his American passport - he got pushed into it. The feds made his life so miserable that giving up citizenship seemed like the only way out. And now? They're coming after him for not paying enough taxes when he left. Talk about having your cake and eating it too.
Ver got nabbed in Spain back in May 2024 because the U.S. wants him extradited. The government claims he hid over 131,000 Bitcoin (BTC) when he renounced his citizenship in 2014 - we're talking about dodging nearly $50 million in taxes here. They've also hit him with mail fraud charges and say he filed bogus tax returns. He's out on bail right now, chilling in Spain while lawyers duke it out over whether he gets shipped back to face the music.
But here's where it gets juicy - Schwartz says he can't tell us everything because of some NDA he signed, but what he can say is pretty damning. "It's way more evil than most people realize," he wrote. That's not exactly the kind of thing you say about a simple tax case.
How Bitcoin Jesus Became Crypto Enemy Number One
Let's rewind a bit. Roger Ver wasn't always the bad guy in crypto circles. This dude was throwing money at Bitcoin startups when everyone else thought crypto was a scam. He invested in BitPay, Kraken, Blockchain.com, and yeah - even Ripple (XRP). Without guys like Ver, we might not even have the crypto ecosystem we know today.
But then 2017 happened, and everything went sideways. Bitcoin was having serious growing pains - transactions were slow and expensive. Ver thought the solution was Bitcoin Cash, which would make transactions faster and cheaper. The Bitcoin hardcore crowd? They weren't having it. Ver went from being the golden boy to persona non grata basically overnight.
The thing is, Schwartz thinks Ver was genuinely trying to do the right thing, even when it made him unpopular. "He thought it was the right thing to do," the Ripple (XRP) CTO said, "and aligned with his pro-freedom values." Basically, Ver stuck to his guns even when it cost him friends and made him enemies.
What Ripple (XRP)'s Boss Really Thinks About Government Overreach
Here's where Schwartz's comments get really interesting. The guy runs tech at a company that just spent years fighting the SEC, so he knows a thing or two about government agencies going after crypto companies. When he says Ver's situation is "way more evil" than it appears, that's coming from someone who's seen how the sausage gets made.
Schwartz's willingness to speak out is pretty telling. Most crypto executives keep their heads down when it comes to controversial cases, but he's basically calling BS on the whole thing. The fact that he's bound by an NDA but still felt compelled to say something suggests there's some seriously shady stuff going on behind the scenes.
Think about it - if this was just about unpaid taxes, would Ripple's CTO be calling it evil? Would he be talking about years of persecution? Probably not. This sounds more like what happens when someone pisses off the wrong people in government and they decide to make an example out of them.
The crypto world has always been about challenging the status quo, and Ver was one of the first to really put his money where his mouth was. Now it looks like he's paying the price for being ahead of the curve. Whether you love him or hate him, what's happening to Roger Ver should probably worry anyone who cares about crypto's future.
Ver's legal team is still fighting the extradition in Spain, but based on Schwartz's comments, this case is about way more than just taxes. It's about what happens when you challenge the system and the system decides to fight back.
Usman Salis
