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Protecting lives, while providing jobs.
BodiGuard sources top-notch talent through an extensive network of qualified professionals comprised of police unions, security personnel training schools, executive protection institutes, US military Special Forces, private security companies, and private executive protection companies.
Meet Our Team
Co-Founder, CEO & CTO
Sinakhone Keodara
Sinakhone founded BodiGuard in 2021 in response to an onslaught of anti-Asian hate attacks. He built this app with his two hands and on an Uber driver's salary. His mission is to provide protectors for vulnerable individuals and small businesses as they move through their lives.
After his first startup AET failed, Sinakhone became homeless and lived in his car and Korean spas while driving for Lyft for nine months from 2018 to 2019. During that time, Sinakhone joined Rideshare Drivers United as an organizer and became instrumental in helping push for the passage of AB5, making rideshare drivers employees in California. Sinakhone got invited by Governor Gavin Newsom to meet with his team as part of the Rideshare Drivers United collective; they also met with state lawmakers in Sacramento. Sinakhone took that inspiration and spearheaded a viral video campaign titled #RideshareReality to tell the stories of Lyft and Uber drivers' plight to survive to gain public support, culminating in the California State Legislature passing AB5 into law. Sinakhone got off the streets shortly after that and became a self-taught Appreneur after taking online courses to learn how to create apps during quarantine.
Before BodiGuard: Sinakhone has always been a Social Justice Warrior. He has volunteered his time and talents to various social justice causes ranging from advocating for the removal of Unexploded Ordnance from Laos left by the United States during the Vietnam War to the gay marriage fight in America to multiple other social justice issues. In 2016, Sinakhone founded a streaming service startup Asian Entertainment Television (AET), to improve Asian American representation in the media and normalize Asian presence in Hollywood. In 2018, he threatened to sue Grindr for allowing the proliferation of sexual racism against gay Asians, culminating in the dating app industry changing its user profile guidelines to ban racist and other discriminatory languages from their platform. Sinakhone studied Film Production at Santa Monica College's Film Program. He is an accomplished screenwriter, a versatile actor, and a gifted filmmaker. Sinakhone was born in Laos and immigrated to the United States in 1986 as a refugee seeking political asylum. He speaks and reads Lao & Thai fluently and is a KRI-Certified Kundalini Yoga Teacher.
Co-Founder and CSO
Dean L. deVilla
Dean L. deVilla of Vienna, Virginia, is a security executive with over 33 years of experience in the U.S. government and corporate security. He has served as a Supervisory Special Agent with the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) with various assignments as the Regional Security Officer at our U.S. diplomatic missions in Tunisia, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Cuba, Uruguay, Poland, and Peru.
Dean brings to BodiGuard his considerable experience in U.S. law enforcement, and international security management, where he serves as a trusted collaborator and stakeholder to government officials, culturally diverse international contacts, corporate management teams, and their staff.
He also served as Agent-in-Charge of various DSS dignitary protection details during U.S. visits of the French, Iraq, Tunisian, and Afghanistan foreign ministers. He has served temporarily on the Secretary of State’s detail during multiple overseas visits. In 2006, he got accepted into The National War College, where he graduated in June 2007 with a Master of Science degree in National Security Strategy. Dean continued service in other DSS leadership roles in criminal investigations, counterintelligence, private security contractor program management for protective security services at the U.S. Mission – Iraq, and U.S. domestic field office management. In 2012, Dean was selected as the Senior Watch Officer to lead the U.S. government’s security Joint Operations Center for the 2012 Olympic games in the UK, where he provided daily security operational leadership of protective security for the U.S. Olympic team, as well as providing daily security operational briefings to the White House National Security Council, the Department of State’s Operations Center, and the U.S. intelligence community. Dean completed his last DSS overseas assignment in July 2016 as the Senior Regional Security Officer at the U.S. Embassy – Lima, Peru (one of South America's largest U.S. diplomatic missions), and wrapped up his DSS career at the DSS Washington (D.C.) Field Office as Assistant Special Agent-in-Charge. In April 2017, Dean retired from Federal service.
Immediately following his retirement, Dean returned to the Department of State as a personal services contract Program Manager with the Office of Anti-terrorism Assistance -- managing the anti-terrorism training and assistance portfolio for U.S.-friendly East Africa nations (Ethiopia, Djibouti, Tanzania, Uganda). In November 2018, Dean joined the Global Security Group of the pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co., Inc. as an Associate Director, leading the management of the company’s physical security programs and projects for Merck’s 237 facilities in the Western Hemisphere.
In addition to a Master of Science degree from The National War College, Dean holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications from the University of Maryland.
