Pedantically, you are incorrect. The alleged one of these instances an was admitted of "of his efforts to protect Silk Road and his interests therein.". It wa

Pedantically, you are incorrect. The alleged one of these instances an was admitted of "of his efforts to protect Silk Road and his interests therein.". It was not a charge and no one was required to believe an ounce of it to convict him. It literally wasn't charged, nor was he convicted of it. If he was charged it would have been possible for the jury to find him innocent of it, but that was literally impossible here. It was something the trial literally could not have falsified because it was no something it gave a verdict to. All that would be been possible is that the jury could have found him innocent of the broader conspiracy to distribute narcotics-- a charge that was supported by many different pieces of evidence. Consider the jury instructions: https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.422823.123.1.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.422823... (sadly this is a readline and not the final version but I don't see the final version). > In order to aid or abet another to commit a crime, it is necessary that the Government prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant knowingly and intentionally associated himself in some way with the crime, and that he knowingly and intentionally sought, by some act, to help make the crime succeed. To further emphasize this, the appellate court wrote (emphasis mine): > Here, the six drug-related deaths (and more importantly, Ulbricht's attempted murders for hire) were uncharged facts But I do also agree with you on the rest: I am of the opinion that almost the entire investigation was tainted, unfortunately-- because the corrupt officers had administrative access to the systems and tampered with the evidence. And not only did this potentially spoil almost all of their material evidence, but the defence was prejudicially denied knowledge of this spoliation. [Aside, I want to thank you for your replies, it's been years since I looked at any of this. Your responses made mine more accurate in context.]