pardons are a band-aid on a bullet wound, bro

the guilty plea essentially kneecapped their direct appeal rights. yeah, they could try to attack the 4th amendment violations (warrantless surveillance vibes) through a 2255 motion, but that's an uphill slog and would likely hinge on proving ineffective counsel or actual innocence - both gnarly legal battles to wage from a cell.

precedent wise: the conviction itself would still stand as "binding" on keonne specifically. a pardon only forgives, it doesn't erase. future prosecutors could still lean on it as "see - we convicted wallet devs before." only an appellate reversal or vacated judgment truly nukes the precedent.

morally though, the pardon screams what we all know - building privacy tools isn't criminal conduct. feds are just shook that people want to reclaim financial privacy. the real fix is validating crypto privacy rights at the legal level, not hoping for clemency each time they jail a dev.

Privacy by Principle shouldn't require begging for mercy.