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Source: Reddit- Private front-end.
(Eastern District of Michigan - Detroit)
My husband, Conrad Rockenhaus, is wrongly incarcerated in a county jail. I’m posting this here because you are one of the few communities that will understand the full technical and political reality of how he ended up there.
My husband is a former Tor operator, and at one point, he ran some of the fastest relays and exit nodes in the world.
This nightmare began when he refused to help the FBI decrypt traffic from his exit nodes.
Months later, the government arrested him. Their official reason? A minor, non-violent CFAA charge from an old workplace dispute that had nothing to do with Tor.
In fact, the statute of limitations was just a couple of months from expiring. It was a clear pretext to target him.
That minor charge was all they needed to get him into the system. To deny him bail, a U.S. Probation Officer in Texas lied under oath, telling a judge that Conrad had installed a "Linux OS called Spice" to "knock out their monitoring software" and access the "dark web."
Here is the technical reality of their lie: The software was a standard SPICE graphics driver needed for his Ph.D. program. As many of you know, this is a basic utility for displaying graphics from a virtual machine. It is not an OS, has no connection to the dark web, and was technically incapable of interfering with their monitoring software.
The claim is a technical absurdity, equivalent to saying a mouse pad can hack a server.
Based on that lie alone, he was held in pre-trial detention for three years.
Now, the retaliation has escalated in Michigan. After I filed a formal complaint against his US probation officers for harassment, they used fraudulent warrants to jail my husband again.
During this violent arrest by US Marshals (who smashed in our windows and nearly shot my dog) he sustained a severe head injury that caused him to have a grand mal seizure in court. The jail’s “medical attention” was to ask him what year it was (he said 2023) and then send him back to his cell. He is being denied real medical care.
See videos:
- Feds threatening to sick dogs on us
- Feds beating by husband in the head
- Feds smashing in our windows
- Feds threaten to shoot my dog
- More threats to shoot my dog
To make matters worse, U.S. District Judge Stephen J. Murphy, III has created a procedural trap that has stripped my husband of his right to a lawyer to fight for his life, health, or innocence. He is trapped in a constitutional and medical crisis.
I am not asking for money. I am asking for your help to amplify this story. You understand the technical truth and why this fight is so important.
We have all the evidence: the court transcript of the false testimony, the fraudulent warrants, the proof of medical neglect. It’s documented on my website:
TL;DR: My husband, a former Tor operator, refused to help the FBI decrypt Tor traffic. They retaliated by using an old, unrelated CFAA offense to arrest him and then lied about him using a "graphics driver to access the dark web” to keep him in pre-trial detention for 3 years. Now he's been jailed again in Michigan on fraudulent violations, is being denied care for a head injury, and has no lawyer.
I need help getting the word out🙏
Adrienne Rockenhaus
For updates:
More Context from her comment:
Seeing a lot of questions and some misinformation in the comments, so I wanted to clarify a few key facts with sources:
- On the original case: My husband did not have a trial. He took a coerced guilty plea in Texas after being held for three years based on perjured testimony about a "SPICE graphics driver." We have the court transcript proving the perjury on our website.
- On the violent arrest: The claim that my husband was "combative" is a complete fabrication, likely being spread to justify the U.S. Marshals' actions. We have the unedited security camera footage of the entire raid, and it proves the opposite.
- On the relevance of Tor: The government's retaliation against our family began after my husband, a Tor exit node operator, refused to help the FBI decrypt traffic. They then used an unrelated workplace dispute as the pretext for the initial charge. The entire case stems from his support for online privacy.
I'm seeing comments about a deeply offensive search term ("NAMBLA") that the prosecution brought up in my husband's 2020 hearing in Texas, and I want to address it directly so there is no confusion. The search was for an article my husband was writing for Encyclopedia Dramatica, a well-known (and very controversial) satirical wiki that parodies offensive topics. He was researching the topic to make fun of it, much like the show South Park did in a famous episode. The prosecution knew this search was irrelevant to the case, but they put it in front of the judge anyway . This is a classic "poison the well" tactic, using something shocking and out-of-context to prejudice a judge against a defendant. It's a hallmark of a malicious prosecution. While they want everyone distracted by this, the real issues are the ones they can't defend: the fraudulent warrants, the perjured testimony, the ongoing medical neglect, and the judge's documented conflict of interest.
Here's the court docket .
It's not very clear from the post: Rockenhaus was convicted on a CFAA charge in Texas in the 2019-2022 time frame. The Michigan case is to revoke supervised release on the CFAA conviction.
I don't have time to get into any of the filings now, but I'll try to get back to it later.
Here's an update that will focus on Mr. Rockenhaus's latest violation of the conditions of his supervised release.
Background: Mr. Rockenhaus was convicted of a serious computer crime, for which he completed a prison sentence. Before he was re-arrested on 4 Sept., 2025, he was serving supervised release. He also was ordered to pay $500k in restitution, as compensation for the business damage he admitted to causing.
#What's happening to him now:
On 29 April, the government filed to revoke his probation. He was arrested on or about 5 May, ordered to appear for violation hearing on 13 May, and released on $10k bond. At the 13 May hearing, he was found in violation, but sentencing was adjourned to September. While out on bond, the government alleged an additional second set of condition violations, prompting his re-arrest 4 Sept. Bond has been revoked, and he remains imprisoned pending sentencing on the first set of violations, next month (this seems to indicate that the sentence will be > 1.5 month).
#Civil cases:
Mr. Rockenhaus and Mrs. Adrienne Rockenhaus filed separate civil rights lawsuits against Mr. Rockenhaus's probation officer. Dockets are here for Mr. Rockenhaus and Mrs. Rockenhaus.
#Opinion:
I've read through the civil complaints, comments Mrs. Rockenhaus published on Hacker News, and the revocation docket. It seems to me that some fishy stuff is going on.
Mr. Rockenhaus requested to proceed in forma pauperis in his civil suit. This means he doesn't have the money to pay the $405 filing fee. In that form, he claims to have exactly zero income, and zero assets.
Mrs. Rockenhaus just paid the $400 fee in her lawsuit.
Mr. Rockenhaus owes ~$400k remaining in restitution (in forma pauperis form). (Recall that's paid down from $543k originally. There's no interest.)
The original sentencing document states that he is to pay 10% of his income each month towards restitution. (final judgement)
The repayment amount was set to $800 in Jan., 2025. This would imply that the court thinks he has $8,000 in monthly income. (Revocation petition)
The probation office attempted to complete a financial investigation of Mr. Rockenhaus's finances, that could have set the payment to a different amount, following the 10% rule. (Revocation petition)
Mr. Rockenhaus did not cooperate with the investigation. He also wasn't paying $800 or any other amount since 2023. (Revocation petition)
At the 13 May revocation hearing, Mr. Rockenhaus admitted to the truth of the above allegations in the petition. (Minute entry near ECF 10)
#Okay, here's where it starts getting weird:
Mr. Rockenhaus is employed by Mrs. Rockenhaus. (Mr. Rockenhaus complaint, allegation 2)
If Mr. Rockenhaus is an employee of his own wife, what is he getting paid? Apparently it's $0 (#1). In my book, that's not employment; it's volunteer work.
If Mr. Rockenhaus is being paid by his own wife, then he should have income on his #1 form, and he should be paying 10% to restitution.
I also think the SSDI income if he has it probably counts as income toward the 10%.
#And now for weirder:
As part of the conditions of his probation, Mr. Rockenhaus must install probation office spyware on all of his computers and electronic devices, and submit to the monitoring. (Revocation petition)
The spyware does not work on iOS devices; consequently Mr. Rockenhaus may not possess an iOS device. (Various sources)
On two different occasions, Mr. Rockenhaus was found to be in possession of 2 different iPhones, and 1 Apple Watch. No spyware was installed. (Revocation petition 1 and 2)
All 3 devices, including the watch are actually work devices for the job he has with his wife. (Both civil complaints)
So, the claim is apparently that Mr. Rockenhaus is allowed to circumvent the monitoring condition by keeping and using his "work phones", even after hours, and even in his home that he presumably shares with his wife.
Again, what kind of job is Mr. Rockenhaus doing where he needs to be issued a phone and a smart watch, but he doesn't get paid?
#About the drugs:
Mrs. Adrienne Rockenhaus operates a business named "Cannabytes, LLC". (Mrs. Rockenhaus complaint, allegation 3.3). This appears to be a marijuana business.
It seems to me like a terminally bad idea for a federal probationer and convicted felon to work at a marijuana business, when marijuana is federally illegal.
#Some other stuff:
Various sources provide clues that the combined Rockenhaus household seems to enjoy a middle-class-ish standard of living. Mr. Rockenhaus drove a car that had an active OnStar subscription; they procured a new iPhone after the first one was seized; etc. etc.
Yet Mr. Rockenhaus has no money to pay restitution.
It seems to me like the household may be structuring things so as to hide marital income and assets from the probation office, to avoid the restitution. If I were a probation officer, that might piss me off.
Even still, I don't know what the law is on this topic with respect to criminal restitution.
On Hacker News, Mrs. Rockenhaus made various defenses to the allegations in Revocation Petition #1. For instance, the 7 lines of credit without permission were all identity theft.
Even still, the time and place to make those defenses was at the 13 May revocation hearing. In court. Not several months later on the Internet. That hearing was the due process that Mr. Rockenhaus is entitled to under the 5th amendment. There is no indication in the record that any defense was made at the hearing.