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The mystery of the disappearing Silk Road murder charges

143 points by brownbat 12y ago

dwyer 12y ago
There was never a single murder charge. Nice linkbait though.
- coding4all 12y ago
  Did you read the article? That's exactly what they're talking about.
- chobo 12y ago
  That's exactly the point of the article: Why no charges after the indictments?
  - puredemo 12y ago
    He may have made a deal.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
ASneakyFox 12y ago
I personally think ulbricht is guilty.. I just wish the prosecutors and investigators didn't rely on so many questionable and in some cases possibly illegal tactics to bring him down. It really just makes him look more innocent. As notorious as he was ( and as bad as he was at online security) the us government shouldn't be having so much trouble to prove their case (assuming their allegations are correct)
- mortov 12y ago
  "I personally think ulbricht is guilty.." Which is presumably the intention of the fanfare around the smears - pollute the jury pool as much as possible to avoid the inconvenience of people making a decision based on the facts or evidence presented in court; get out the jury deliberations quickly, just go for whatever knee-jerk guilty feeling you got when you read the headlines about how evil the defendant is; don't bother reading any detail or anything that might hurt your brain and destroy your prejudices ! Despite my reservations, the US would be better served if it had contempt of court laws like England which specifically prohibit discussion of any details of court cases prior to them being heard precisely in order to stop this sort of situation happening. edit: spelling.
  - ceejayoz 12y ago
    Pollute the jury pool? If they bring in 100 potential jurors maybe one might have some basic knowledge about Bitcoin if they're lucky. A few might recall hearing about it on the nightly news once. Chances are none will have heard anything about "the Dread Pirate Roberts".
- madaxe_again 12y ago
  Guilty... interesting word. Guilty of what? Under which jurisdiction? By whose measure? The media's? Yours? I assume you'd like a tarring and feathering? Shouldn't you also be talking about the state's guilt for using "possibly illegal" tactics, as I'd say that sticking false charges on someone for murder is a damn sight worse than being an intermediary in an illicit marketplace. Hell, why aren't they going after banks for providing cash, which is an anonymous "currency" used on the illegal drug marketplaces known as "the park" and "behind the nursery school"? I think the man deserves respect for sticking his neck out and doing something that's sparked fundamental discourse on drug policy.
  - s_q_b 12y ago
    Guilty of violating the USC Drug Kingping Act amongst others. Guilty of running an $80 million narcotics ring. Guilty of murder for hire. Guilty under the law as written. You may believe him innocent by appeal to natural law, or un-prosecutable due to the Fourth Amendment, and on the latter you may be right. But from a moral standpoint, "guilty" is definitely the right word.
    - brainburn 12y ago
      Innocent until proven guilty in a court of law
      - s_q_b 12y ago
        So was Charles Manson before his trial. I'm saying he's guilty, not a court. It's one man's opinion, not a finding of fact or law. The fact pattern isn't really in dispute here. Do you really deny he performed the acts of which he is accused? EDIT due to reply limit: Fine, its your opinion that I'm a child molester, but since you can't enforce it, I have little reason to care. In the instant case, I am perfectly capable of examining an indictment and concluding as to its likely veracity. It doesn't make the person legally guilty, but in my personal unbinding and most modest opinion, morally so.
        12y ago
- s_q_b 12y ago
  I love it. They used to say "The only way to know what the Times is free to print anything it wishes is for the Enquirer to be able to do so too." Ubricht proved we're not dealing with supervillians. Just security experts with lots of funding. Ordinary humans that can be set back using tech just like us. Their difficulty in proving their case gives me hope that there's still time to make technology a force for good, both within and without government.
- tomp 12y ago
  I too think he is guilty. Guilty of breaking non-sense, victim-less laws. Laws that restrict usage of non-addictive mind-altering substances that are much less harmful than other, legal drugs (alcohol, tobacco, medical drugs). Laws that shouldn't even be on the books! Laws that cause millions of dollars of damage and thousands of deaths each year. Laws that power organized crime. The drug laws. I totally support him, and I hope he comes out a free man, albeit his business will probably be ruined.
  - hncomplete 12y ago
    SR also sold identity theft kits, hacking tools and such. It was not just a place of victimless crime. It would be nice if just ONE of you DPR-loving sociopaths would be honest enough to admit this.
    - etherael 12y ago
      Compared with the crimes of the entity actually mounting the prosecution, everything he was alleged to have done is at worst a misdemeanor. But you will never get a sociopathic state worshiping authoritarian to admit they don't have the moral high ground. Letalone that their treasured institutions are practically identical to the terrorist organisations that they say they exist to protect the innocent from.
      - hahainternet 12y ago
        > you will never get a sociopathic state worshiping authoritarian to admit they don't have the moral high ground If you're willing to post this level of stupidity then just come out with "OBAMA IS HITLER" without mincing words so we can tell you're deluded and ignore your posts.
      - hncomplete 12y ago
        Apparently thinking that identity theft (which harms individuals) sucks also means I worship the state. Right. Religious zealots always get mad when facts ruin their ideological narratives. Ethereal, you are now, and will always be, an utterly worthless shitstain on humanity. I won't couch this in distancing language. I'll own the fact that you're an asshole, that you're passive-aggressive, and that HN would be materially better if the mods had the balls to ban assholes like you.
- logfromblammo 12y ago
  I personally think that I should be skeptical of information released by entities that have a vested interest in influencing public opinion. I think it highly likely that the prosecution is going over the evidence that it intends to use with a fine-toothed comb to avoid potential embarrassments during discovery. As this is a somewhat newsworthy case, they are going to be particularly cautious about making sure all the keystone facts are supported by admissible evidence. On top of that, they have to conceal some of their tactics so that they can continue to use them successfully in the future. If Ulbricht did solicit murder for hire, I'm not entirely certain that he would have even thought of trying that if government agents were not already investigating him, due to his involvement in the drug trade. It might have been entrapment, just as a means of putting him into police custody, making him unable to interfere with further investigations by erasing trails that had not yet been followed, and also providing a means to seize his Bitcoins. By that hypothesis, the state suspects he is Dread Pirate Roberts, but lacks the evidence to prove it. People in custody are less able to shield themselves from investigations. So they set him up with an illegal entrapment that would not necessarily support a conviction, but is plenty good enough for an indictment and arrest. Then they grab him and execute warrants based on the "I gotcha, sucka" charges that will end up supporting the drug kingpin case. With that access, they make seizures and file civil forfeiture cases against the assets, because the legal standards for those are woefully skewed in the state's favor. The prosecutor declines to pursue the murder for hire charges because he always knew they were bogus, and instead dumps all the gathered evidence into the drug trafficking and racketeering charges, as it is now sanitized by warrants under the previous indictment. If that is indeed what has happened here, and it results in a conviction, I don't care how guilty Ulbricht is, because the state should not be able to corrupt our legal system in that fashion. He should go free, and the prosecutors and police that were involved should fill that cell in his place.
  - kemayo 12y ago
    > It might have been entrapment, just as a means of putting him into police custody, making him unable to interfere with further investigations by erasing trails that had not yet been followed, and also providing a means to seize his Bitcoins. It's only entrapment if government agents persuaded him to commit a crime he wasn't otherwise inclined to commit. For it to be a defense he'd have to show that the government actively talked him into hiring someone -- just offering to do it and seeing if he takes them up on it isn't enough. (The analogy I've seen used is that an undercover cop saying "hey, want to buy some cocaine?" isn't entrapment.)
aikah 12y ago
> Dread Pirate Roberts once wrote prolifically about non-violence, even saying “#SilkRoad while under my watch will never harm a soul. It's unlikely Ulbricht created SilkRoad ,he's probably not the first Dread Pirate Roberts.
- arcatek 12y ago
  What makes you think that, except the movie reference?
  - ksherlock 12y ago
    he made that claim himself in an interview. http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/14/an-interview-with-a-digital-drug-lord-the-silk-roads-dread-pirate-roberts-qa/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/14/an-inte...
    - gweinberg 12y ago
      There's a bit of a joke here. Obviously the first guy to call himself "Dread Pirate Roberts" couldn't have chosen that name because he wasn't the first, right? But it's perfectly plausible that he chose the name because he didn't intend to be the last.
    - chobo 12y ago
      I'm not sure that claim itself makes it likely or unlikely. Could be the truth, could be an obfuscation tactic. No way of knowing at this point.
- duaneb 12y ago
  Is there any evidence he is NOT the first dread pirate roberts, aside from his saying so?
- AgentME 12y ago
  Ulbricht publicly used an email address containing his first and last name when he first talked about Silk Road around its start, and before its start, he talked about wanting to make some type of Bitcoin marketplace. The idea that he's not the first DPR is a joke about the name or obfuscation tactic he used in an interview.
tempodox 12y ago
“Justice” in the U.S. has always been a bad joke. The best you can hope for is a completely random outcome (“a jury of your peers“, what a laugh), or, as in this case, a politically motivated campaign that ignores truth, decency, all due process, and the principles why we have something like laws in the first place. In the Silk Road case the pure unadulterated power of corruption would have been completely sufficient to reach the outcome; bothering the law with that is nothing but an embellishment and a fig leaf. I feel reminded of Iraq's WMDs and the embarrassing spectacle around Kim Dotcom. Seems like the U.S. gov't will spread publicly any lies that seem convenient at the time, never mind the consequences.
- hockeybias 12y ago
  Psssst... Hey... Your ignorance is showing.
- gadders 12y ago
  The WMDs that ISIS has found in Iraq and is using now?
  - ta74747 12y ago
    The pretext for the war was Iraq having an active WMD program. What ISIS has are stockpiles from before Iraq dismantled their WMD program (which was prior to the invasion).
    - runjake 12y ago
      WMD stockpiles supplied by the US for use against the Iranians in the 1980s. So in fact, we had a pretty good idea that Saddam had WMDs. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction#Western_help_with_Iraq.27s_WMD_program http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_and_weapons_of_mass_destru...
      - csorrell 12y ago
        I was under the impression that the shelf life on most of these WMDs (chemical nerve agents) is only 5 years or so. So we had a pretty good idea about what Saddam was holding, but they were almost certainly unusable at the time of the invasion.
Evolved 12y ago
If Ulbricht is guilty for providing a safe place to buy illegal drugs then aren't San Francisco and other cities complicit since they hand out clean needles freely for addicts to use? Sure the idea behind it is noble but aren't both still technically illegal whether you supply the paraphernalia and you absolutely know what will be done with it or whether you provide a safe environment where people can trade $ for drugs?
- refurb 12y ago
  One of those actions is allowed by the law and the other isn't. I would say that's the distinction.
  - hawleyal 12y ago
    Laws belong to us. We change them all the time.
    - refurb 12y ago
      When they are changed then I'll agree.
      - atom-morgan 12y ago
        Are you skeptical that the law will change or do you agree with whatever the law is?
        duaneb 12y ago
        I'm sceptical that any number of people disliking a law will lead to it being changed.
  - Evolved 12y ago
    The problem becomes when the laws are structured to favor certain entities or when the laws purposely aren't changed because they're a very useful financial tool for 3-letter agencies.
Evolved 12y ago
Let's clear up a very often perpetuated and very disingenuous misconception. Silk Road did NOT sell a damn thing. Silk Road (the website and very much the same as the actual location) was a conduit for sellers to do their business. SR merely provided a safe environment and safe alternative for people who are going to get their drugs one way or another. Arguably a much safer alternative as well since the purity and accuracy of content could be better verified than what you get off the street. Therefore, Ulbricht is no more a drug trafficker than John Donahoe (CEO of eBay) sells iphone screen protectors and decorative beads for art projects.
- forrestthewoods 12y ago
  I'm going to strongly disagree with your last point. How many sellers were on Silk Road? How many of them sold drugs? Take this percentage and compare it to the number of eBay auctions that are for iphone screen protectors or dedocrate beads. These numbers will differ by more than a few orders of magnitude. It's not reasonable to compare them. If you know your service is being used for drug trafficking to a significant degree and you don't try to stop it then yes, you do hold some responsibility and can be held accountable. Morally, ethically, and legally.
  - crazypyro 12y ago
    Legal problems are obvious, so I'll focus on the ethical/moral side. I think it is wrong to equate drug trafficking, in any sense, to a moral or ethical argument. Those questions do not yet have concrete, society-accepted answers, so by imposing the ethical and moral objects on drugs, we are in danger of simply following the status quo without question, I think. There are also cases where the most moral or ethical thing to do would be allow a patient to use a state-controlled/restricted drug, if it would save their lives. If we were to follow this argument to its conclusion, there may be a moral or ethical argument that it would be wrong for him to attempt to shutdown the ability of a patient to acquire life-improving drugs. tl;dr: Equating legal wrong to moral/ethical wrong is not always the right way.
    - forrestthewoods 12y ago
at-fates-hands 12y ago
I love it when non-legal people report on the legal system, get a ton of shit wrong and then point at the system and say how broken it is. First of all, Federal indictments are almost always granted to the prosecutor. This lead to the now famous quote from the story about a ham sandwich. This is the because of the Supreme Court case United States v. R Enterprises, Inc: "federal grand jury subpoenas are presumed to be reasonable and the burden of showing unreasonableness is on the recipient. A motion to quash a federal grand jury subpoena on relevancy grounds must be denied unless, “there is no reasonable possibility that the category of materials the Government seeks will produce information relevant to the general subject of the grand jury's investigation.” source: http://corporate.findlaw.com/litigation-disputes/federal-grand-jury-crash-course.html http://corporate.findlaw.com/litigation-disputes/federal-gra... All a grand jury does is determine if there is enough compelling evidence to try a person for a crime, that's it. To say those charges have been dropped is misleading. All the prosecutor has to do is reinstate the indictments and they can proceed with those charges. They didn't "fall off the table" like the article states, the government hasn't formally charged Albrecht yet - something which could happen if he walks in his other case. Just because the government is dragging its feet on these charges doesn't mean they don't intend to charge him. Like I've said before, the murder charge is essentially an ace in the hole for the prosecutors. If he walks on the Silk Road charges, they can pursue their murder charges against him and reinstate all the murder indictments and formally charge him with those - it's pretty simple. The article makes it seem like the government has dropped all the charges and thus, he's innocent of what he's been accused of. On the contrary, the writer simply is misinformed about how the legal system works.
- Evolved 12y ago
  If you're going to present yourself as more knowledgeable than the rest of us as far as the law goes then it would be prudent to read the article and get the defendant's name correct. Given that the information that would implicate him in Silk Road might very well be from the same area as the alleged murders then one can reasonably assume if he walks on the SR charges then he could also potentially walk on those charges. In response to your comment about the indictments, is it not also possible that the jurisdictions that obtained the indictments (because they're so easy to get as you say) doesn't actually have sufficient evidence to present even a prima facie case or perhaps the information they did obtain was obtained illegally and thus they don't want to lose on those counts so to save face they drop the counts? Perhaps it is as the author states where the indictments were used to obtain a no-bail status so Ulbricht doesn't flee (assuming he has other funds hidden elsewhere). All of what I said is what some folks (myself included) in the non-legal world would consider to be "reasonable doubt."
AgentME 12y ago
The murder charges appeared to be a bullshit charade that both DPR and the "victim" knew. The transcripts are available online somewhere. Some guy anonymously messages DPR, telling DPR that he found an exploit in the Silk Road, stole some information on a lot of big-time sellers, and was going to release it if DPR didn't pay him some large amount of money. DPR flat-out rejects the other. The guy then said he owed money to a dealer that he re-sold drugs to, explains that if DPR could settle his debts with the dealer then he'd be happy, and then he gave DPR that dealer's (anonymous) contact info. If you're anonymously trying to blackmail someone, why on earth would you tell your target the contact information of a third party who knows where you live AND who shares a motive against you? The story as-is is barely believable. The "dealer" then offers to solve the problem of the blackmailer for DPR, and asks for an amount of money, suspiciously a little lower than the amount the blackmailer wanted. DPR pays him, and no longer worries about his customer data seller being leaked. There's no evidence that the "dealer"/assassin was a real person, or that any murder ever occurred. The dealer and the blackmailer only ever anonymously communicated with DPR, and no one else. The blackmailer introduced the dealer/assassin to DPR unprompted. No one besides each other knew who they were. It seems likely they're the same person. The whole thing appears to be a weird charade for the blackmailer to barter with DPR down a price to not leak the data.
- Evolved 12y ago
  I'm going to go flat-out conspiracy theorist and say that DPR/alleged dealer/blackmailer are all the same person and he concocted this story and leaked it to let everyone know how seriously he takes privacy. Unfortunately, the prosecution will probably say it had to do with intent and use that as a reason for why the public should be protected from DPR. Either way I agree with the points you made. Also very bad opsec for DPR to not smell something fishy with the story if it is in fact a different person and even worse to act on it if that is in fact what happened.
  - gwern 12y ago
    > I'm going to go flat-out conspiracy theorist and say that DPR/alleged dealer/blackmailer are all the same person and he concocted this story and leaked it to let everyone know how seriously he takes privacy. That incident was not known publicly before Ulbricht was arrested and the complaints released.
canjobear 12y ago
It seems the murder for hire charges were dropped because no murders can be shown to have taken place. But isn't it still a crime to pay for murder, even if it does not actually take place? The logs in the indictment documents sure made it sound like Ulbricht thought he was ordering real murders.
- at-fates-hands 12y ago
  Yes, very much so. It's also a federal crime which means you're subject to those sentencing guidelines: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1958 http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1958 18 U.S. Code § 1958 - Use of interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire (a) Whoever travels in or causes another (including the intended victim) to travel in interstate or foreign commerce, or uses or causes another (including the intended victim) to use the mail or any facility of interstate or foreign commerce, with intent that a murder be committed in violation of the laws of any State or the United States as consideration for the receipt of, or as consideration for a promise or agreement to pay, anything of pecuniary value, or who conspires to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for not more than ten years, or both; and if personal injury results, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for not more than twenty years, or both; and if death results, shall be punished by death or life imprisonment, or shall be fined not more than $250,000, or both. (b) As used in this section and section 1959— (1) “anything of pecuniary value” means anything of value in the form of money, a negotiable instrument, a commercial interest, or anything else the primary significance of which is economic advantage; (2) “facility of interstate or foreign commerce” includes means of transportation and communication; and (3) “State” includes a State of the United States, the District of Columbia, and any commonwealth, territory, or possession of the United States.
  - Evolved 12y ago
    Fortunately, from what we know about the case, that information is on the same servers that are alleged to have been hacked illegally by the FBI which would make their contents inadmissible and thus, a boom for DPR.

143 points by brownbat 12y ago

dwyer 12y ago

There was never a single murder charge. Nice linkbait though.

coding4all 12y ago
Did you read the article? That's exactly what they're talking about.
chobo 12y ago
That's exactly the point of the article: Why no charges after the indictments?
- puredemo 12y ago
  He may have made a deal.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

ASneakyFox 12y ago

I personally think ulbricht is guilty.. I just wish the prosecutors and investigators didn't rely on so many questionable and in some cases possibly illegal tactics to bring him down. It really just makes him look more innocent. As notorious as he was ( and as bad as he was at online security) the us government shouldn't be having so much trouble to prove their case (assuming their allegations are correct)

mortov 12y ago
"I personally think ulbricht is guilty.." Which is presumably the intention of the fanfare around the smears - pollute the jury pool as much as possible to avoid the inconvenience of people making a decision based on the facts or evidence presented in court; get out the jury deliberations quickly, just go for whatever knee-jerk guilty feeling you got when you read the headlines about how evil the defendant is; don't bother reading any detail or anything that might hurt your brain and destroy your prejudices ! Despite my reservations, the US would be better served if it had contempt of court laws like England which specifically prohibit discussion of any details of court cases prior to them being heard precisely in order to stop this sort of situation happening. edit: spelling.
- ceejayoz 12y ago
  Pollute the jury pool? If they bring in 100 potential jurors maybe one might have some basic knowledge about Bitcoin if they're lucky. A few might recall hearing about it on the nightly news once. Chances are none will have heard anything about "the Dread Pirate Roberts".
madaxe_again 12y ago
Guilty... interesting word. Guilty of what? Under which jurisdiction? By whose measure? The media's? Yours? I assume you'd like a tarring and feathering? Shouldn't you also be talking about the state's guilt for using "possibly illegal" tactics, as I'd say that sticking false charges on someone for murder is a damn sight worse than being an intermediary in an illicit marketplace. Hell, why aren't they going after banks for providing cash, which is an anonymous "currency" used on the illegal drug marketplaces known as "the park" and "behind the nursery school"? I think the man deserves respect for sticking his neck out and doing something that's sparked fundamental discourse on drug policy.
- s_q_b 12y ago
  Guilty of violating the USC Drug Kingping Act amongst others. Guilty of running an $80 million narcotics ring. Guilty of murder for hire. Guilty under the law as written. You may believe him innocent by appeal to natural law, or un-prosecutable due to the Fourth Amendment, and on the latter you may be right. But from a moral standpoint, "guilty" is definitely the right word.
  - brainburn 12y ago
    Innocent until proven guilty in a court of law
    - s_q_b 12y ago
      So was Charles Manson before his trial. I'm saying he's guilty, not a court. It's one man's opinion, not a finding of fact or law. The fact pattern isn't really in dispute here. Do you really deny he performed the acts of which he is accused? EDIT due to reply limit: Fine, its your opinion that I'm a child molester, but since you can't enforce it, I have little reason to care. In the instant case, I am perfectly capable of examining an indictment and concluding as to its likely veracity. It doesn't make the person legally guilty, but in my personal unbinding and most modest opinion, morally so.
      - 12y ago
s_q_b 12y ago
I love it. They used to say "The only way to know what the Times is free to print anything it wishes is for the Enquirer to be able to do so too." Ubricht proved we're not dealing with supervillians. Just security experts with lots of funding. Ordinary humans that can be set back using tech just like us. Their difficulty in proving their case gives me hope that there's still time to make technology a force for good, both within and without government.
tomp 12y ago
I too think he is guilty. Guilty of breaking non-sense, victim-less laws. Laws that restrict usage of non-addictive mind-altering substances that are much less harmful than other, legal drugs (alcohol, tobacco, medical drugs). Laws that shouldn't even be on the books! Laws that cause millions of dollars of damage and thousands of deaths each year. Laws that power organized crime. The drug laws. I totally support him, and I hope he comes out a free man, albeit his business will probably be ruined.
- hncomplete 12y ago
  SR also sold identity theft kits, hacking tools and such. It was not just a place of victimless crime. It would be nice if just ONE of you DPR-loving sociopaths would be honest enough to admit this.
  - etherael 12y ago
    Compared with the crimes of the entity actually mounting the prosecution, everything he was alleged to have done is at worst a misdemeanor. But you will never get a sociopathic state worshiping authoritarian to admit they don't have the moral high ground. Letalone that their treasured institutions are practically identical to the terrorist organisations that they say they exist to protect the innocent from.
    - hahainternet 12y ago
      > you will never get a sociopathic state worshiping authoritarian to admit they don't have the moral high ground If you're willing to post this level of stupidity then just come out with "OBAMA IS HITLER" without mincing words so we can tell you're deluded and ignore your posts.
    - hncomplete 12y ago
      Apparently thinking that identity theft (which harms individuals) sucks also means I worship the state. Right. Religious zealots always get mad when facts ruin their ideological narratives. Ethereal, you are now, and will always be, an utterly worthless shitstain on humanity. I won't couch this in distancing language. I'll own the fact that you're an asshole, that you're passive-aggressive, and that HN would be materially better if the mods had the balls to ban assholes like you.
logfromblammo 12y ago
I personally think that I should be skeptical of information released by entities that have a vested interest in influencing public opinion. I think it highly likely that the prosecution is going over the evidence that it intends to use with a fine-toothed comb to avoid potential embarrassments during discovery. As this is a somewhat newsworthy case, they are going to be particularly cautious about making sure all the keystone facts are supported by admissible evidence. On top of that, they have to conceal some of their tactics so that they can continue to use them successfully in the future. If Ulbricht did solicit murder for hire, I'm not entirely certain that he would have even thought of trying that if government agents were not already investigating him, due to his involvement in the drug trade. It might have been entrapment, just as a means of putting him into police custody, making him unable to interfere with further investigations by erasing trails that had not yet been followed, and also providing a means to seize his Bitcoins. By that hypothesis, the state suspects he is Dread Pirate Roberts, but lacks the evidence to prove it. People in custody are less able to shield themselves from investigations. So they set him up with an illegal entrapment that would not necessarily support a conviction, but is plenty good enough for an indictment and arrest. Then they grab him and execute warrants based on the "I gotcha, sucka" charges that will end up supporting the drug kingpin case. With that access, they make seizures and file civil forfeiture cases against the assets, because the legal standards for those are woefully skewed in the state's favor. The prosecutor declines to pursue the murder for hire charges because he always knew they were bogus, and instead dumps all the gathered evidence into the drug trafficking and racketeering charges, as it is now sanitized by warrants under the previous indictment. If that is indeed what has happened here, and it results in a conviction, I don't care how guilty Ulbricht is, because the state should not be able to corrupt our legal system in that fashion. He should go free, and the prosecutors and police that were involved should fill that cell in his place.
- kemayo 12y ago
  > It might have been entrapment, just as a means of putting him into police custody, making him unable to interfere with further investigations by erasing trails that had not yet been followed, and also providing a means to seize his Bitcoins. It's only entrapment if government agents persuaded him to commit a crime he wasn't otherwise inclined to commit. For it to be a defense he'd have to show that the government actively talked him into hiring someone -- just offering to do it and seeing if he takes them up on it isn't enough. (The analogy I've seen used is that an undercover cop saying "hey, want to buy some cocaine?" isn't entrapment.)

aikah 12y ago

> Dread Pirate Roberts once wrote prolifically about non-violence, even saying “#SilkRoad while under my watch will never harm a soul. It's unlikely Ulbricht created SilkRoad ,he's probably not the first Dread Pirate Roberts.

arcatek 12y ago
What makes you think that, except the movie reference?
- ksherlock 12y ago
  he made that claim himself in an interview. http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/14/an-interview-with-a-digital-drug-lord-the-silk-roads-dread-pirate-roberts-qa/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/14/an-inte...
  - gweinberg 12y ago
    There's a bit of a joke here. Obviously the first guy to call himself "Dread Pirate Roberts" couldn't have chosen that name because he wasn't the first, right? But it's perfectly plausible that he chose the name because he didn't intend to be the last.
  - chobo 12y ago
    I'm not sure that claim itself makes it likely or unlikely. Could be the truth, could be an obfuscation tactic. No way of knowing at this point.
duaneb 12y ago
Is there any evidence he is NOT the first dread pirate roberts, aside from his saying so?
AgentME 12y ago
Ulbricht publicly used an email address containing his first and last name when he first talked about Silk Road around its start, and before its start, he talked about wanting to make some type of Bitcoin marketplace. The idea that he's not the first DPR is a joke about the name or obfuscation tactic he used in an interview.

tempodox 12y ago

“Justice” in the U.S. has always been a bad joke. The best you can hope for is a completely random outcome (“a jury of your peers“, what a laugh), or, as in this case, a politically motivated campaign that ignores truth, decency, all due process, and the principles why we have something like laws in the first place. In the Silk Road case the pure unadulterated power of corruption would have been completely sufficient to reach the outcome; bothering the law with that is nothing but an embellishment and a fig leaf. I feel reminded of Iraq's WMDs and the embarrassing spectacle around Kim Dotcom. Seems like the U.S. gov't will spread publicly any lies that seem convenient at the time, never mind the consequences.

hockeybias 12y ago
Psssst... Hey... Your ignorance is showing.
gadders 12y ago
The WMDs that ISIS has found in Iraq and is using now?
- ta74747 12y ago
  The pretext for the war was Iraq having an active WMD program. What ISIS has are stockpiles from before Iraq dismantled their WMD program (which was prior to the invasion).
  - runjake 12y ago
    WMD stockpiles supplied by the US for use against the Iranians in the 1980s. So in fact, we had a pretty good idea that Saddam had WMDs. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction#Western_help_with_Iraq.27s_WMD_program http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_and_weapons_of_mass_destru...
    - csorrell 12y ago
      I was under the impression that the shelf life on most of these WMDs (chemical nerve agents) is only 5 years or so. So we had a pretty good idea about what Saddam was holding, but they were almost certainly unusable at the time of the invasion.

Evolved 12y ago

If Ulbricht is guilty for providing a safe place to buy illegal drugs then aren't San Francisco and other cities complicit since they hand out clean needles freely for addicts to use? Sure the idea behind it is noble but aren't both still technically illegal whether you supply the paraphernalia and you absolutely know what will be done with it or whether you provide a safe environment where people can trade $ for drugs?

refurb 12y ago
One of those actions is allowed by the law and the other isn't. I would say that's the distinction.
- hawleyal 12y ago
  Laws belong to us. We change them all the time.
  - refurb 12y ago
    When they are changed then I'll agree.
    - atom-morgan 12y ago
      Are you skeptical that the law will change or do you agree with whatever the law is?
      - duaneb 12y ago
        I'm sceptical that any number of people disliking a law will lead to it being changed.
- Evolved 12y ago
  The problem becomes when the laws are structured to favor certain entities or when the laws purposely aren't changed because they're a very useful financial tool for 3-letter agencies.

Evolved 12y ago

Let's clear up a very often perpetuated and very disingenuous misconception. Silk Road did NOT sell a damn thing. Silk Road (the website and very much the same as the actual location) was a conduit for sellers to do their business. SR merely provided a safe environment and safe alternative for people who are going to get their drugs one way or another. Arguably a much safer alternative as well since the purity and accuracy of content could be better verified than what you get off the street. Therefore, Ulbricht is no more a drug trafficker than John Donahoe (CEO of eBay) sells iphone screen protectors and decorative beads for art projects.

forrestthewoods 12y ago
I'm going to strongly disagree with your last point. How many sellers were on Silk Road? How many of them sold drugs? Take this percentage and compare it to the number of eBay auctions that are for iphone screen protectors or dedocrate beads. These numbers will differ by more than a few orders of magnitude. It's not reasonable to compare them. If you know your service is being used for drug trafficking to a significant degree and you don't try to stop it then yes, you do hold some responsibility and can be held accountable. Morally, ethically, and legally.
- crazypyro 12y ago
  Legal problems are obvious, so I'll focus on the ethical/moral side. I think it is wrong to equate drug trafficking, in any sense, to a moral or ethical argument. Those questions do not yet have concrete, society-accepted answers, so by imposing the ethical and moral objects on drugs, we are in danger of simply following the status quo without question, I think. There are also cases where the most moral or ethical thing to do would be allow a patient to use a state-controlled/restricted drug, if it would save their lives. If we were to follow this argument to its conclusion, there may be a moral or ethical argument that it would be wrong for him to attempt to shutdown the ability of a patient to acquire life-improving drugs. tl;dr: Equating legal wrong to moral/ethical wrong is not always the right way.
  - forrestthewoods 12y ago

at-fates-hands 12y ago

I love it when non-legal people report on the legal system, get a ton of shit wrong and then point at the system and say how broken it is. First of all, Federal indictments are almost always granted to the prosecutor. This lead to the now famous quote from the story about a ham sandwich. This is the because of the Supreme Court case United States v. R Enterprises, Inc: "federal grand jury subpoenas are presumed to be reasonable and the burden of showing unreasonableness is on the recipient. A motion to quash a federal grand jury subpoena on relevancy grounds must be denied unless, “there is no reasonable possibility that the category of materials the Government seeks will produce information relevant to the general subject of the grand jury's investigation.” source: http://corporate.findlaw.com/litigation-disputes/federal-grand-jury-crash-course.html http://corporate.findlaw.com/litigation-disputes/federal-gra... All a grand jury does is determine if there is enough compelling evidence to try a person for a crime, that's it. To say those charges have been dropped is misleading. All the prosecutor has to do is reinstate the indictments and they can proceed with those charges. They didn't "fall off the table" like the article states, the government hasn't formally charged Albrecht yet - something which could happen if he walks in his other case. Just because the government is dragging its feet on these charges doesn't mean they don't intend to charge him. Like I've said before, the murder charge is essentially an ace in the hole for the prosecutors. If he walks on the Silk Road charges, they can pursue their murder charges against him and reinstate all the murder indictments and formally charge him with those - it's pretty simple. The article makes it seem like the government has dropped all the charges and thus, he's innocent of what he's been accused of. On the contrary, the writer simply is misinformed about how the legal system works.

Evolved 12y ago
If you're going to present yourself as more knowledgeable than the rest of us as far as the law goes then it would be prudent to read the article and get the defendant's name correct. Given that the information that would implicate him in Silk Road might very well be from the same area as the alleged murders then one can reasonably assume if he walks on the SR charges then he could also potentially walk on those charges. In response to your comment about the indictments, is it not also possible that the jurisdictions that obtained the indictments (because they're so easy to get as you say) doesn't actually have sufficient evidence to present even a prima facie case or perhaps the information they did obtain was obtained illegally and thus they don't want to lose on those counts so to save face they drop the counts? Perhaps it is as the author states where the indictments were used to obtain a no-bail status so Ulbricht doesn't flee (assuming he has other funds hidden elsewhere). All of what I said is what some folks (myself included) in the non-legal world would consider to be "reasonable doubt."

AgentME 12y ago

The murder charges appeared to be a bullshit charade that both DPR and the "victim" knew. The transcripts are available online somewhere. Some guy anonymously messages DPR, telling DPR that he found an exploit in the Silk Road, stole some information on a lot of big-time sellers, and was going to release it if DPR didn't pay him some large amount of money. DPR flat-out rejects the other. The guy then said he owed money to a dealer that he re-sold drugs to, explains that if DPR could settle his debts with the dealer then he'd be happy, and then he gave DPR that dealer's (anonymous) contact info. If you're anonymously trying to blackmail someone, why on earth would you tell your target the contact information of a third party who knows where you live AND who shares a motive against you? The story as-is is barely believable. The "dealer" then offers to solve the problem of the blackmailer for DPR, and asks for an amount of money, suspiciously a little lower than the amount the blackmailer wanted. DPR pays him, and no longer worries about his customer data seller being leaked. There's no evidence that the "dealer"/assassin was a real person, or that any murder ever occurred. The dealer and the blackmailer only ever anonymously communicated with DPR, and no one else. The blackmailer introduced the dealer/assassin to DPR unprompted. No one besides each other knew who they were. It seems likely they're the same person. The whole thing appears to be a weird charade for the blackmailer to barter with DPR down a price to not leak the data.

Evolved 12y ago
I'm going to go flat-out conspiracy theorist and say that DPR/alleged dealer/blackmailer are all the same person and he concocted this story and leaked it to let everyone know how seriously he takes privacy. Unfortunately, the prosecution will probably say it had to do with intent and use that as a reason for why the public should be protected from DPR. Either way I agree with the points you made. Also very bad opsec for DPR to not smell something fishy with the story if it is in fact a different person and even worse to act on it if that is in fact what happened.
- gwern 12y ago
  > I'm going to go flat-out conspiracy theorist and say that DPR/alleged dealer/blackmailer are all the same person and he concocted this story and leaked it to let everyone know how seriously he takes privacy. That incident was not known publicly before Ulbricht was arrested and the complaints released.

canjobear 12y ago

It seems the murder for hire charges were dropped because no murders can be shown to have taken place. But isn't it still a crime to pay for murder, even if it does not actually take place? The logs in the indictment documents sure made it sound like Ulbricht thought he was ordering real murders.

at-fates-hands 12y ago
Yes, very much so. It's also a federal crime which means you're subject to those sentencing guidelines: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1958 http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1958 18 U.S. Code § 1958 - Use of interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire (a) Whoever travels in or causes another (including the intended victim) to travel in interstate or foreign commerce, or uses or causes another (including the intended victim) to use the mail or any facility of interstate or foreign commerce, with intent that a murder be committed in violation of the laws of any State or the United States as consideration for the receipt of, or as consideration for a promise or agreement to pay, anything of pecuniary value, or who conspires to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for not more than ten years, or both; and if personal injury results, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for not more than twenty years, or both; and if death results, shall be punished by death or life imprisonment, or shall be fined not more than $250,000, or both. (b) As used in this section and section 1959— (1) “anything of pecuniary value” means anything of value in the form of money, a negotiable instrument, a commercial interest, or anything else the primary significance of which is economic advantage; (2) “facility of interstate or foreign commerce” includes means of transportation and communication; and (3) “State” includes a State of the United States, the District of Columbia, and any commonwealth, territory, or possession of the United States.
- Evolved 12y ago
  Fortunately, from what we know about the case, that information is on the same servers that are alleged to have been hacked illegally by the FBI which would make their contents inadmissible and thus, a boom for DPR.