18 ms·

Defense in Silk Road Trial Says Mt. Gox CEO Was the Real Dread Pirate Roberts

480 points by jordn 12y ago

obilgic 12y ago
Both Silk Road and mt.gox were written in PHP which Mark Karpeles is fan of.
- joshmn 12y ago
  While really valid, you also have to take into account what kind of hosting services are provided on Tor. Of course, one could host the solution themselves.
  - mculp 12y ago
    It was self-hosted. The only real hosting service ever on the darknet was Freedom Hosting, and its operator got busted (for having customers who hosted CP.)
    - lione 12y ago
      IIRC, not just for having customers who did that, but that he KNOWINGLY hosted and let those customers use his services.
- mortehu 12y ago
  Do they have the code for both? In that case, and if they're written by the same person, this can be very easy to determine, e.g. due to code reuse across projects.
- code_duck 12y ago
  Given that PHP is one of the most widely used languages for making websites, if not the most, that link seems rather flimsy.
malloreon 12y ago
If this is true then nearly all of bitcoin's growth over the last 3 years can be directly attributable to Mark Karpeles, either in the form of outright price manipulation, or the running of illegal goods marketplaces.
- krapp 12y ago
  It would be ironic if the gold standard for decentralized, anarcho-capitalist currencies turned out to be more centrally controlled than the USD....
  - mculp 12y ago
    "Centrally controlled" is not the same thing as one guy who has a very large stake. Bitcoin, by definition, is not "centrally controlled." It doesn't matter how many coins any entity controls, there's nothing that it could do to actually break the system or remove the inherent value of bitcoin. The fact that there are thousands and thousands of miners and nodes around the world protecting the ledger (the blockchain) is what makes bitcoin so groundbreaking.
    - vegedor 12y ago
      >Bitcoin, by definition, is not "centrally controlled." Except if more than 50% mining capacity is held by a single entity, you know that.
    - krapp 12y ago
      Ok fine. If not 'controlled' then manipulated, perhaps.
DigitalSea 12y ago
I wonder if this play will hold up? When they busted Ulbricht at a public library, didn't they catch him in the act of talking to agent DerYeghiayan via Pidgin who told Ross to check out a support ticket? I thought they had screenshots of the chat as well as Ulbricht being logged into the site itself. They have conclusively linked Ulbricht to the site, however, they have failed to conclusively prove that he is the mastermind of the site itself and that there weren't others involved. So my limited understanding here and what this case is actually about is that it is not so much trying to prove that Ulbricht had anything to do with the site (because the association was proven), but rather who actually was the mastermind behind the site (and pocketing large sums of cash from transactions). Seems association with such a site would carry a lesser charge than being the one who was profiting off of the marketplace and behind its original conception (this is my limited understanding and it could be wrong). This story is absolutely insane, it will be interesting to see where this case heads. From what I gather, the bust in the library, screenshots of the chat and admin panel of the site and supposedly a few scrunched up pieces of paper found in the bin of Ulbrichts home are all they have (that we know about). There is nothing that actually proves or disproves that either Ulbricht or Karpeles, are the owners of Silk Road. Now we just need the defence to come out and claim that Karpeles is actually Satoshi Nakamoto and then we've got ourselves a super interesting case. There is undoubtedly a movie script in here somewhere once the case is finished.
- mey 12y ago
  The entity of DPR put out a hit. Proving out who/whom is DPR is part of the important consideration of charges.
  - paulrosenzweig 12y ago
    He's not being charged with that, but the jury is seeing the evidence. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/01/judge-govt-can-show-murder-for-hire-evidence-in-silk-road-trial/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/01/judge-govt-can-sh...
- dwd 12y ago
  Substitute Keyser Soze for Satoshi Nakamoto in every article you have ever read about him and you have a movie script.
spiralpolitik 12y ago
Are they really trying the "Chewbacca defense" ? Johnnie Cochran would be proud.
- Dylan16807 12y ago
  What the heck are you talking about? The defense is based on law enforcement's own investigations pointing at a different culprit. How is that in any way related to a defense based on confusing the jury with a non sequitur?
lexcorvus 12y ago
Not one but two (nearly identical) references to "The Princess Bride" have been flagkilled. I understand not wanting to devolve into reddit, but is HN really so humorless? This is life imitating art, people. In this context, such references are 100% on-point. He wasn't the real Dread Pirate Roberts either. The real Roberts has been retired fifteen years and living like a king in Patagonia.
- krapp 12y ago
  It stops being funny after a while.
- jndsn402 12y ago
  This. Thank you. And if I may digress into some meta-HN analysis, the original comment received about 7 upvotes in the few minutes after it was posted (i.e. when it was near the top). But when newer comments came in and it was near the bottom, that's when the downvoting started.
  - Dylan16807 12y ago
    Interesting. Now stop calling your own comment 'awesome', please. And you have very lax standards for 'timely'.
- lexcorvus 12y ago
  is HN really so humorless? The verdict is in: yes, HN really is so humorless. Such a pity.
svs 12y ago
DPR Karpeles = DPRK = Democratic People's Republic of Korea = North Korea! I knew the North Koreans would be somehow involved!
ipsin 12y ago
One thing I haven't see in the legal analysis: If Ulbricht is guilty of the things that the defense has stipulated (building and running SilkRoad for some period of time), doesn't that mean he's admitted to most of the relevant charges? I'm not sure what the "I'm not the kingpin" defense actually buys.
- fleitz 12y ago
  It depends on the specific acts he's being charged with, if he can create reasonable doubts to that then he's not guilty. 'Operating SilkRoad' isn't a crime, trafficking drugs is.
  - titaniumdecoy 12y ago
    How are those two things different exactly?
    - bmelton 12y ago
      Depending on one's interpretation of common carrier, it's the same as the difference between "delivering email from user a to user b" and "conspiring with terrorists"
jedanbik 12y ago
So does this mean that Karpeles will/could be summoned for examination? I am very intrigued by this juicy turn of events.
CodeWriter23 12y ago
The subtle implication here is "throw some shit at the wall and see what sticks" was Der-Yeghiayan's investigative method of choice. Always good to discredit the prosecution's lead witnesses if you can.
mhomde 12y ago
If this theory wouldn't make a an awesome yarn for a Sorkin/Fincher movie I don't know what would. Karpeles to be played by Paul Giamatti and Ulbricht by Robert Pattinson.
jmtame 12y ago
I called Mark Karpeles the DPR on Twitter and he replied "PHP is good for the right job." He's obviously guilty.
downandout 12y ago
It's an interesting tactic, but will likely fall upon deaf ears. They arrested him at the library while he was logged into the site as an admin. That, combined with the fact that he possessed a Bitcoin wallet with ~144,000 BTC (worth ~$28.5 million at the time) in it, will likely carry more weight than any argument that other people were possibly running it. They also admitted on day 1 of the trial that he created SR - they are just saying that he turned it over to someone else and wasn't running it. All the government has to prove now is that he profited from it, which seems like a very low hurdle given the amount of BTC he had. Based upon all of this, I'd say he has a 99.9% chance of conviction, and will receive a sentence that will amount to life in prison. This judge will make an example out of him.
- Cthulhu_ 12y ago
  I hate to be pedantic, but, bitcoin wallets don't contain dollars. You can express bitcoin value in dollars, but that's a number that can change on a daily basis. It's like saying "he had a stock portfolio with $28 million in it"
  - downandout 12y ago
    Yes, you are being pedantic. I did, however, edit the comment to make it more clear in case anyone else feels like being pedantic.
  - Erikun 12y ago
    If you hate being pedantic, why be it?
    - jkaunisv1 12y ago
      Here's my perspective as a chronic pedant: my inherent* value system puts a high value on completeness of knowledge/understanding and clarity. But as a socially-aware human, I recognize people's dislike of pedantic behavior. Life is a fairly constant battle between satisfying my brain's need to provide clarity and not annoying people with often excessive or unwanted detail. Sometimes the itch to correct is strong enough that it's very difficult to ignore, even though I know it probably won't be well-received. * I say inherent because while I consciously value knowledge/clarity, I'd presently like to move past such strong obsession but I'm working against a couple decades of all the small events that have shaped my brain.
ErrantX 12y ago
The only chance Ulbricht seems to have at this stage, admittedly from where I am sitting, seems to be one where his team employs "defence through obscurity". If they can bog the trial down in technical details, question the witness credibility, and point fingers toward others then it will distract from harder evidence to counter. It's a fairly common trial strategy, and sometimes it works.
at-fates-hands 12y ago
This has become the Tech Industries version of the OJ Trial. As someone who followed that trial very closely, I think the coverage of this trial has been really good.
norswap 12y ago
All this talk about "reasonable doubt" reminded me of "12 Angry Men" (1), a 1957 movie that follows a jury in its deliberation of whether a man committed murder or not. The whole movie takes place in a single room, with the 12 same actors, yet it manages to be captivating throughout. Really a great piece of cinema. There's even a relevant xkcd (2). (1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Angry_Men http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Angry_Men (2) http://xkcd.com/657/ http://xkcd.com/657/
negamax 12y ago
This is very interesting.
rudolf0 12y ago
I don't think there was anything fundamentally unethical about Silk Road (other than the owner very likely attempting to have several people murdered, of course), but the defense is clearly grasping at straws here.
- jMyles 12y ago
  > very likely I take issue with this characterization. Unless there is a much, much more realistic piece of evidence yet to emerge, I regard this allegation as very unlikely. And if it's not true, and all DPR did was help people to circumvent laws prohibiting transactions of prohibited substances, then he's a libertarian hero.
- sp332 12y ago
  From reporter https://twitter.com/sarahjeong https://twitter.com/sarahjeong Trial adjourned. There's a lot going on. DHS agent was pursuing Karpeles as late as August 2013. Ulbricht was arrested Oct 2013. Like I wrote in my last article, he went after Ulbricht based on a tip off from an IRS agent in September 2013. Whiplash! Amazing moment later today: in affadavit, DHS agent referred to @a_greenberg's interview of DPR and said it sounded like Mark Karpeles. Recall, this is the same guy who was on a 6 person team to arrest Ulbricht. In Aug '13 he said he had probable cause to suspect Karpeles.
  - sp332 12y ago
    [More tweets] DHS agent acknowledged under cross that he was preparing an affadavit for a warrant to search Karpeles's email. DHS agent's OWN THEORY around early to mid 2013 was that Mt. Gox and Silk Road worked in tandem. Investigation found that Mutum Sigilum, a Karpeles holding, had registered silkroadmarket.org
- krapp 12y ago
  Whatever one thinks about Silk Road, darknets or drug policy in general (I have issues with all of them) I would hope that Ulbricht could get a better defense than one that seems as farcical as this. I don't know what it would be. Maybe they're hoping people will think it's too crazy not to be true? The only possible way it isn't a complete joke is if it's true.
jndsn402 12y ago
The real Dread Pirate Roberts has been retired for fifteen years and is living like a king in Patagonia. EDIT: Downvote all you want, my friends. I'll take an awesome and timely Princess Bride joke over HN karma any day.
copsarebastards 12y ago
This headline seems unbelievable, but if all the evidence in the article it is actually real, it does cast some reasonable doubt. An alternative which hasn't been discussed yet is that maybe Karpeles was the Dread Pirate Roberts and then Ulbricht was. It has long been theorized that, like the original name from The Princess Bride, the title "Dread Pirate Roberts" was passed from person to person. DerYeghiayan seems to have had some reason to believe that Karpeles was DPR, while the prosecution seems to have reason to believe that Ulbricht is DPR. Why not both?
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- jndsn402 12y ago
  I thought the defense's case was that Ulbricht was the original, and then passed it on to someone else (now revealed to be Karpeles).
  - copsarebastards 12y ago
    I may have misunderstood the defense, but how does that make any sense as a defense? You don't stop being guilty of running an illegal drug marketplace just because you pass the running of the illegal drug marketplace on to someone else.
  - ceallen 12y ago
    He also claims they passed it back to him immediately before the bust. Only slightly more effective than the "I was holding it for a friend" legal defense.
    - jsprogrammer 12y ago
      Claims have to be backed with evidence.
      - toolz 12y ago
        Only if you're prosecuting. If you're defending yourself, all you have to do is make it sound believable given the circumstances. A jury can find you not guilty just because they don't like the law. To defend yourself in a U.S. court you technically wouldn't need any evidence to substantiate any of your claims just so long as the jury buys it.
Cub3 12y ago
This would be an insane story if true but will wait for the facts to come out before jumping to conclusions
josu 12y ago
A slightly different take on the news from The Verge: http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/15/7553591/silk-road-trial-ross-ulbricht-mt-gox-mark-karpeles http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/15/7553591/silk-road-trial-ro...
ChuckMcM 12y ago
This is slowly developing the patina of an academy award winning movie :-). Sad for the folks involved by interesting to watch.
- angrymonk 12y ago
  Maybe one must be made ...
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
clogston 12y ago
For those not reading the article, please note this isn't just a claim made by the defense. This came out of cross examination of a DHS agent. "You thought you had probable cause that Mark Karpeles was intimately involved, as the head of Silk Road, correct?" Dratel asked Homeland Security agent Jared Der-Yeghiayan. "By the contents of that affidavit—yes," he answered.
- zamalek 12y ago
  So in layman's terms, would I be right in saying that the defense is effectively saying that the prosecution is taking a "shotgun approach?" In a more obvious claim, they are said to be pulling random people off the street? If that's the case it's a fascinating defense, I'd love to be able to watch it live.
  - andrewfong 12y ago
    I don't think that's accurate. The defense has only identified one other person investigated by the police, which doesn't make for much of a "shotgun". I think the defense is probably doing one of or both of the following: (1) The defense is trying to impeach the testimony of the aforementioned DHS agent. The unstated implication is that if the agent changes his opinion about the identity of DPR, then his opinions aren't very reliable and shouldn't be taken seriously by the jury. (2) If the underlying reasons for this DHS agent's belief that Karpeles was DPR are still valid, then the defense could use those reasons to show reasonable doubt as to the true identity of DPR. Basically, "if the DHS agent doubted that DPR was Ulbricht, then it's reasonable you doubt that too!"
    - zamalek 12y ago
      Right, all about that "reasonable doubt" thing we always hear about. Still a fascinating case, thanks for the clarification!
  - roel_v 12y ago
    No, in layman's terms: they're bullshitting in a desperate , last-ditch attempt, because any sane defense has a snowball's chance in hell (even less than this insane Scooby Doo-style 'revelation') and (apparently) the prosecutor didn't agree to any plea bargain (because let's face it, anything less than the 20 years this guy is looking at would be an awesome deal for him). Is there really anyone who seriously thinks this guy is not going to convicted?
sandworm 12y ago
Lol. When I was at school this tactic, creating doubt by blaming someone else, was called "Plan B" after a plot line from the TV series The Practice.
- bitcoinillati 12y ago
  It worked for Casey Anthony
- imjk 12y ago
  It's almost a requirement in a criminal defense case to have an alternative culprit, just the same way that it's almost required to have a motive and a weapon in a homicide case. The defense needs to raise a reasonable doubt that Ulbriicht wasn't the criminal and that's best done by presenting an alternative culprit.
  - sandworm 12y ago
    There are no "homicide cases" in court. That might be term used by some cops to indicate a case involving a body, but even then it is ambiguous as cops often don't know whether the body was "killed" or whether they killed themselves. Homicide just means a killing by someone else (suicide is not homicide). State execution is also considered homicide even though there is no chargeable crime. Actual crimes from homicide range from the various types of murder, manslaughter, felony-murder, Misdemeanor-manslaughter, negligence causing death, vehicular manslaughter ... and others I cannot remember off the top of my head. I agree that weapons are a good thing to have but are far from necessary, especially when there aren't any (murder through neglect). Motives are equally unnecessary. Google "one-punch murder". You don't need a motive to be guilty, unless by motive you mean "mens rea", a very different concept.
    - eru 12y ago
      > Motives are equally unnecessary. Really? Wasn't a motive one of the things keeping murder and manslaughter apart? (IANAL.)
t0dd 12y ago
From The Verge article (http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/15/7553591/silk-road-trial-ross-ulbricht-mt-gox-mark-karpeles http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/15/7553591/silk-road-trial-ro...): "One of Karpeles' companies had registered 'Silkroadmarket.org,' leading investigators to consider him as a suspect." Silk Road launched in February 2011: that's the same month Karpeles (or his associate at Mutum Sigilum) registered the domain https://who.is/domain-history/silkroadmarket.org https://who.is/domain-history/silkroadmarket.org
- danielweber 12y ago
  The most likely explanation is that Karpeles saw someone else do something, and tried to ride its coattails.
  - MertsA 12y ago
    He sure did it awful quickly, the site also credited "- Silk Road Staff" at the bottom of the message. Then there's downtime messages from time to time, it seems rather unlikely that MK is DPR but there very well might be something behind this. The domain wasn't registered to John Smith, it was registered in the name of a company that Mark Karpeles owns and pointing to Mark Karpeles name servers.
- gweinberg 12y ago
  That's really bad reasoning on the part of the investigators. Registering a .org domain name similar to the name of your secret underground site is a stupid and completely pointless thing to do.
  - diminoten 12y ago
    They don't have to convince a jury it was Karpeles, just that it may not have been Ulbricht.
  - CodeWriter23 12y ago
    And also the kind of mistake someone with poor opsec would make.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
adamnemecek 12y ago
Someone call Aaron Sorkin and David Fincher to get in on this.
- ballpoint 12y ago
  I'm sure they don't need calling. They'll be all over this...
mhurron 12y ago
He wasn't the real Dread Pirate Roberts either. The real Roberts has been retired fifteen years and living like a king in Patagonia.
- taternuts 12y ago
  Now that's an obscure reference
  - mod 12y ago
    It doesn't seem so obscure after two people have made it in nearly identical lingo. That said, I have no idea what it references.
    - cheald 12y ago
      The "Dread Pirate Roberts" moniker is from a (wonderful) movie called "The Princess Bride". In it, the hero assumes the mantle of the "Dread Pirate Roberts", and is at least the fourth successor to the title. It's an interesting factor in this case, because the choice of name hints that the "Dread Pirate Roberts" handle was chosen so it could be passed from person to person. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHZGqBVBCRw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHZGqBVBCRw
      - gojomo 12y ago
        Notably also the judge has apparently admonished the jury not to watch The Princess Bride: https://twitter.com/sarahjeong/status/555847465128435712 https://twitter.com/sarahjeong/status/555847465128435712
        cheald 12y ago
        That monster.
        mhurron 12y ago
        Inconceivable.
jlrubin 12y ago
Breaking News: Mark Karpeles says that Ross Ulbricht is responsible for Mt. Gox theft, was actually the CEO of the the failed exchange the whole time. That said, this is actually a great defense.
- danielweber 12y ago
  It's one thing to falsely claim you didn't do it. It's another thing entirely to falsely claim someone else did it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistaken_identity#SODDI_Defense http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistaken_identity#SODDI_Defense
  - tedunangst 12y ago
    Wikipedia doesn't cite any examples or references for the claim that it's illegal to blame somebody else. In the US, you have pretty wide latitude to say what you want in court. The closest example I can think of is Amanda Knox, who was prosecuted for slander for suggesting that the police investigators didn't do their job properly as part of her defense. That happened in Italy, however.
    - rnovak 12y ago
      It is by definition Slander/Defamation (depending on the medium) to make a provable statement against someone else without substantiation. Meaning, if you claim someone is AKA someone else, that is a provable statement. Saying someone is an asshole is not a provable statement. EFF has a good article on this[1], they call it a 'statement of fact'. From what I understand though, the defense was trying to IMPLY rather than outright, or rather, just bring up a reasonable alternate explanation. [1]https://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/liability/defamation https://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/liability/defamati... Edit: Seriously? It's an informative post, why the downvote hate?
      - x0x0 12y ago
        testimony in court and court filings is, as far as I know, absolutely privileged with respect to defamation -- even if it is false If for no other reason, this is necessary so that a trial doesn't devolve into an endless cycle of suit and counter-suit
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
jmtame 12y ago
Up next, Satoshi Nakamoto is revealed to be Mark Karpeles
- jkeat 12y ago
  well, http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com//2013/11/23/study-suggests-link-between-dread-pirate-roberts-and-satoshi-nakamoto/ http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com//2013/11/23/study-suggests-lin... but they later retracted their claim. http://www.businessinsider.com/silk-road-satoshi-paper-retraction-2013-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/silk-road-satoshi-paper-retra...
  - markburns 12y ago
    Interesting point from the retraction article. > He says the account was randomly assigned to him by the Mt. Gox exchange So the suggestion that DPR is not Satoshi relates to evidence from Mt Gox.

480 points by jordn 12y ago

obilgic 12y ago

Both Silk Road and mt.gox were written in PHP which Mark Karpeles is fan of.

joshmn 12y ago
While really valid, you also have to take into account what kind of hosting services are provided on Tor. Of course, one could host the solution themselves.
- mculp 12y ago
  It was self-hosted. The only real hosting service ever on the darknet was Freedom Hosting, and its operator got busted (for having customers who hosted CP.)
  - lione 12y ago
    IIRC, not just for having customers who did that, but that he KNOWINGLY hosted and let those customers use his services.
mortehu 12y ago
Do they have the code for both? In that case, and if they're written by the same person, this can be very easy to determine, e.g. due to code reuse across projects.
code_duck 12y ago
Given that PHP is one of the most widely used languages for making websites, if not the most, that link seems rather flimsy.

malloreon 12y ago

If this is true then nearly all of bitcoin's growth over the last 3 years can be directly attributable to Mark Karpeles, either in the form of outright price manipulation, or the running of illegal goods marketplaces.

krapp 12y ago
It would be ironic if the gold standard for decentralized, anarcho-capitalist currencies turned out to be more centrally controlled than the USD....
- mculp 12y ago
  "Centrally controlled" is not the same thing as one guy who has a very large stake. Bitcoin, by definition, is not "centrally controlled." It doesn't matter how many coins any entity controls, there's nothing that it could do to actually break the system or remove the inherent value of bitcoin. The fact that there are thousands and thousands of miners and nodes around the world protecting the ledger (the blockchain) is what makes bitcoin so groundbreaking.
  - vegedor 12y ago
    >Bitcoin, by definition, is not "centrally controlled." Except if more than 50% mining capacity is held by a single entity, you know that.
  - krapp 12y ago
    Ok fine. If not 'controlled' then manipulated, perhaps.

DigitalSea 12y ago

I wonder if this play will hold up? When they busted Ulbricht at a public library, didn't they catch him in the act of talking to agent DerYeghiayan via Pidgin who told Ross to check out a support ticket? I thought they had screenshots of the chat as well as Ulbricht being logged into the site itself. They have conclusively linked Ulbricht to the site, however, they have failed to conclusively prove that he is the mastermind of the site itself and that there weren't others involved. So my limited understanding here and what this case is actually about is that it is not so much trying to prove that Ulbricht had anything to do with the site (because the association was proven), but rather who actually was the mastermind behind the site (and pocketing large sums of cash from transactions). Seems association with such a site would carry a lesser charge than being the one who was profiting off of the marketplace and behind its original conception (this is my limited understanding and it could be wrong). This story is absolutely insane, it will be interesting to see where this case heads. From what I gather, the bust in the library, screenshots of the chat and admin panel of the site and supposedly a few scrunched up pieces of paper found in the bin of Ulbrichts home are all they have (that we know about). There is nothing that actually proves or disproves that either Ulbricht or Karpeles, are the owners of Silk Road. Now we just need the defence to come out and claim that Karpeles is actually Satoshi Nakamoto and then we've got ourselves a super interesting case. There is undoubtedly a movie script in here somewhere once the case is finished.

mey 12y ago
The entity of DPR put out a hit. Proving out who/whom is DPR is part of the important consideration of charges.
- paulrosenzweig 12y ago
  He's not being charged with that, but the jury is seeing the evidence. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/01/judge-govt-can-show-murder-for-hire-evidence-in-silk-road-trial/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/01/judge-govt-can-sh...
dwd 12y ago
Substitute Keyser Soze for Satoshi Nakamoto in every article you have ever read about him and you have a movie script.

spiralpolitik 12y ago

Are they really trying the "Chewbacca defense" ? Johnnie Cochran would be proud.

Dylan16807 12y ago
What the heck are you talking about? The defense is based on law enforcement's own investigations pointing at a different culprit. How is that in any way related to a defense based on confusing the jury with a non sequitur?

lexcorvus 12y ago

Not one but two (nearly identical) references to "The Princess Bride" have been flagkilled. I understand not wanting to devolve into reddit, but is HN really so humorless? This is life imitating art, people. In this context, such references are 100% on-point. He wasn't the real Dread Pirate Roberts either. The real Roberts has been retired fifteen years and living like a king in Patagonia.

krapp 12y ago
It stops being funny after a while.
jndsn402 12y ago
This. Thank you. And if I may digress into some meta-HN analysis, the original comment received about 7 upvotes in the few minutes after it was posted (i.e. when it was near the top). But when newer comments came in and it was near the bottom, that's when the downvoting started.
- Dylan16807 12y ago
  Interesting. Now stop calling your own comment 'awesome', please. And you have very lax standards for 'timely'.
lexcorvus 12y ago
is HN really so humorless? The verdict is in: yes, HN really is so humorless. Such a pity.

svs 12y ago

DPR Karpeles = DPRK = Democratic People's Republic of Korea = North Korea! I knew the North Koreans would be somehow involved!

ipsin 12y ago

One thing I haven't see in the legal analysis: If Ulbricht is guilty of the things that the defense has stipulated (building and running SilkRoad for some period of time), doesn't that mean he's admitted to most of the relevant charges? I'm not sure what the "I'm not the kingpin" defense actually buys.

fleitz 12y ago
It depends on the specific acts he's being charged with, if he can create reasonable doubts to that then he's not guilty. 'Operating SilkRoad' isn't a crime, trafficking drugs is.
- titaniumdecoy 12y ago
  How are those two things different exactly?
  - bmelton 12y ago
    Depending on one's interpretation of common carrier, it's the same as the difference between "delivering email from user a to user b" and "conspiring with terrorists"

jedanbik 12y ago

So does this mean that Karpeles will/could be summoned for examination? I am very intrigued by this juicy turn of events.

CodeWriter23 12y ago

The subtle implication here is "throw some shit at the wall and see what sticks" was Der-Yeghiayan's investigative method of choice. Always good to discredit the prosecution's lead witnesses if you can.

mhomde 12y ago

If this theory wouldn't make a an awesome yarn for a Sorkin/Fincher movie I don't know what would. Karpeles to be played by Paul Giamatti and Ulbricht by Robert Pattinson.

jmtame 12y ago

I called Mark Karpeles the DPR on Twitter and he replied "PHP is good for the right job." He's obviously guilty.

downandout 12y ago

It's an interesting tactic, but will likely fall upon deaf ears. They arrested him at the library while he was logged into the site as an admin. That, combined with the fact that he possessed a Bitcoin wallet with ~144,000 BTC (worth ~$28.5 million at the time) in it, will likely carry more weight than any argument that other people were possibly running it. They also admitted on day 1 of the trial that he created SR - they are just saying that he turned it over to someone else and wasn't running it. All the government has to prove now is that he profited from it, which seems like a very low hurdle given the amount of BTC he had. Based upon all of this, I'd say he has a 99.9% chance of conviction, and will receive a sentence that will amount to life in prison. This judge will make an example out of him.

Cthulhu_ 12y ago
I hate to be pedantic, but, bitcoin wallets don't contain dollars. You can express bitcoin value in dollars, but that's a number that can change on a daily basis. It's like saying "he had a stock portfolio with $28 million in it"
- downandout 12y ago
  Yes, you are being pedantic. I did, however, edit the comment to make it more clear in case anyone else feels like being pedantic.
- Erikun 12y ago
  If you hate being pedantic, why be it?
  - jkaunisv1 12y ago
    Here's my perspective as a chronic pedant: my inherent* value system puts a high value on completeness of knowledge/understanding and clarity. But as a socially-aware human, I recognize people's dislike of pedantic behavior. Life is a fairly constant battle between satisfying my brain's need to provide clarity and not annoying people with often excessive or unwanted detail. Sometimes the itch to correct is strong enough that it's very difficult to ignore, even though I know it probably won't be well-received. * I say inherent because while I consciously value knowledge/clarity, I'd presently like to move past such strong obsession but I'm working against a couple decades of all the small events that have shaped my brain.

ErrantX 12y ago

The only chance Ulbricht seems to have at this stage, admittedly from where I am sitting, seems to be one where his team employs "defence through obscurity". If they can bog the trial down in technical details, question the witness credibility, and point fingers toward others then it will distract from harder evidence to counter. It's a fairly common trial strategy, and sometimes it works.

at-fates-hands 12y ago

This has become the Tech Industries version of the OJ Trial. As someone who followed that trial very closely, I think the coverage of this trial has been really good.

norswap 12y ago

All this talk about "reasonable doubt" reminded me of "12 Angry Men" (1), a 1957 movie that follows a jury in its deliberation of whether a man committed murder or not. The whole movie takes place in a single room, with the 12 same actors, yet it manages to be captivating throughout. Really a great piece of cinema. There's even a relevant xkcd (2). (1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Angry_Men http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Angry_Men (2) http://xkcd.com/657/ http://xkcd.com/657/

negamax 12y ago

This is very interesting.

rudolf0 12y ago

I don't think there was anything fundamentally unethical about Silk Road (other than the owner very likely attempting to have several people murdered, of course), but the defense is clearly grasping at straws here.

jMyles 12y ago
> very likely I take issue with this characterization. Unless there is a much, much more realistic piece of evidence yet to emerge, I regard this allegation as very unlikely. And if it's not true, and all DPR did was help people to circumvent laws prohibiting transactions of prohibited substances, then he's a libertarian hero.
sp332 12y ago
From reporter https://twitter.com/sarahjeong https://twitter.com/sarahjeong Trial adjourned. There's a lot going on. DHS agent was pursuing Karpeles as late as August 2013. Ulbricht was arrested Oct 2013. Like I wrote in my last article, he went after Ulbricht based on a tip off from an IRS agent in September 2013. Whiplash! Amazing moment later today: in affadavit, DHS agent referred to @a_greenberg's interview of DPR and said it sounded like Mark Karpeles. Recall, this is the same guy who was on a 6 person team to arrest Ulbricht. In Aug '13 he said he had probable cause to suspect Karpeles.
- sp332 12y ago
  [More tweets] DHS agent acknowledged under cross that he was preparing an affadavit for a warrant to search Karpeles's email. DHS agent's OWN THEORY around early to mid 2013 was that Mt. Gox and Silk Road worked in tandem. Investigation found that Mutum Sigilum, a Karpeles holding, had registered silkroadmarket.org
krapp 12y ago
Whatever one thinks about Silk Road, darknets or drug policy in general (I have issues with all of them) I would hope that Ulbricht could get a better defense than one that seems as farcical as this. I don't know what it would be. Maybe they're hoping people will think it's too crazy not to be true? The only possible way it isn't a complete joke is if it's true.

jndsn402 12y ago

The real Dread Pirate Roberts has been retired for fifteen years and is living like a king in Patagonia. EDIT: Downvote all you want, my friends. I'll take an awesome and timely Princess Bride joke over HN karma any day.

copsarebastards 12y ago

This headline seems unbelievable, but if all the evidence in the article it is actually real, it does cast some reasonable doubt. An alternative which hasn't been discussed yet is that maybe Karpeles was the Dread Pirate Roberts and then Ulbricht was. It has long been theorized that, like the original name from The Princess Bride, the title "Dread Pirate Roberts" was passed from person to person. DerYeghiayan seems to have had some reason to believe that Karpeles was DPR, while the prosecution seems to have reason to believe that Ulbricht is DPR. Why not both?

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
jndsn402 12y ago
I thought the defense's case was that Ulbricht was the original, and then passed it on to someone else (now revealed to be Karpeles).
- copsarebastards 12y ago
  I may have misunderstood the defense, but how does that make any sense as a defense? You don't stop being guilty of running an illegal drug marketplace just because you pass the running of the illegal drug marketplace on to someone else.
- ceallen 12y ago
  He also claims they passed it back to him immediately before the bust. Only slightly more effective than the "I was holding it for a friend" legal defense.
  - jsprogrammer 12y ago
    Claims have to be backed with evidence.
    - toolz 12y ago
      Only if you're prosecuting. If you're defending yourself, all you have to do is make it sound believable given the circumstances. A jury can find you not guilty just because they don't like the law. To defend yourself in a U.S. court you technically wouldn't need any evidence to substantiate any of your claims just so long as the jury buys it.

Cub3 12y ago

This would be an insane story if true but will wait for the facts to come out before jumping to conclusions

josu 12y ago

A slightly different take on the news from The Verge: http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/15/7553591/silk-road-trial-ross-ulbricht-mt-gox-mark-karpeles http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/15/7553591/silk-road-trial-ro...

ChuckMcM 12y ago

This is slowly developing the patina of an academy award winning movie :-). Sad for the folks involved by interesting to watch.

angrymonk 12y ago
Maybe one must be made ...

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

clogston 12y ago

For those not reading the article, please note this isn't just a claim made by the defense. This came out of cross examination of a DHS agent. "You thought you had probable cause that Mark Karpeles was intimately involved, as the head of Silk Road, correct?" Dratel asked Homeland Security agent Jared Der-Yeghiayan. "By the contents of that affidavit—yes," he answered.

zamalek 12y ago
So in layman's terms, would I be right in saying that the defense is effectively saying that the prosecution is taking a "shotgun approach?" In a more obvious claim, they are said to be pulling random people off the street? If that's the case it's a fascinating defense, I'd love to be able to watch it live.
- andrewfong 12y ago
  I don't think that's accurate. The defense has only identified one other person investigated by the police, which doesn't make for much of a "shotgun". I think the defense is probably doing one of or both of the following: (1) The defense is trying to impeach the testimony of the aforementioned DHS agent. The unstated implication is that if the agent changes his opinion about the identity of DPR, then his opinions aren't very reliable and shouldn't be taken seriously by the jury. (2) If the underlying reasons for this DHS agent's belief that Karpeles was DPR are still valid, then the defense could use those reasons to show reasonable doubt as to the true identity of DPR. Basically, "if the DHS agent doubted that DPR was Ulbricht, then it's reasonable you doubt that too!"
  - zamalek 12y ago
    Right, all about that "reasonable doubt" thing we always hear about. Still a fascinating case, thanks for the clarification!
- roel_v 12y ago
  No, in layman's terms: they're bullshitting in a desperate , last-ditch attempt, because any sane defense has a snowball's chance in hell (even less than this insane Scooby Doo-style 'revelation') and (apparently) the prosecutor didn't agree to any plea bargain (because let's face it, anything less than the 20 years this guy is looking at would be an awesome deal for him). Is there really anyone who seriously thinks this guy is not going to convicted?

sandworm 12y ago

Lol. When I was at school this tactic, creating doubt by blaming someone else, was called "Plan B" after a plot line from the TV series The Practice.

bitcoinillati 12y ago
It worked for Casey Anthony
imjk 12y ago
It's almost a requirement in a criminal defense case to have an alternative culprit, just the same way that it's almost required to have a motive and a weapon in a homicide case. The defense needs to raise a reasonable doubt that Ulbriicht wasn't the criminal and that's best done by presenting an alternative culprit.
- sandworm 12y ago
  There are no "homicide cases" in court. That might be term used by some cops to indicate a case involving a body, but even then it is ambiguous as cops often don't know whether the body was "killed" or whether they killed themselves. Homicide just means a killing by someone else (suicide is not homicide). State execution is also considered homicide even though there is no chargeable crime. Actual crimes from homicide range from the various types of murder, manslaughter, felony-murder, Misdemeanor-manslaughter, negligence causing death, vehicular manslaughter ... and others I cannot remember off the top of my head. I agree that weapons are a good thing to have but are far from necessary, especially when there aren't any (murder through neglect). Motives are equally unnecessary. Google "one-punch murder". You don't need a motive to be guilty, unless by motive you mean "mens rea", a very different concept.
  - eru 12y ago
    > Motives are equally unnecessary. Really? Wasn't a motive one of the things keeping murder and manslaughter apart? (IANAL.)

t0dd 12y ago

From The Verge article (http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/15/7553591/silk-road-trial-ross-ulbricht-mt-gox-mark-karpeles http://www.theverge.com/2015/1/15/7553591/silk-road-trial-ro...): "One of Karpeles' companies had registered 'Silkroadmarket.org,' leading investigators to consider him as a suspect." Silk Road launched in February 2011: that's the same month Karpeles (or his associate at Mutum Sigilum) registered the domain https://who.is/domain-history/silkroadmarket.org https://who.is/domain-history/silkroadmarket.org

danielweber 12y ago
The most likely explanation is that Karpeles saw someone else do something, and tried to ride its coattails.
- MertsA 12y ago
  He sure did it awful quickly, the site also credited "- Silk Road Staff" at the bottom of the message. Then there's downtime messages from time to time, it seems rather unlikely that MK is DPR but there very well might be something behind this. The domain wasn't registered to John Smith, it was registered in the name of a company that Mark Karpeles owns and pointing to Mark Karpeles name servers.
gweinberg 12y ago
That's really bad reasoning on the part of the investigators. Registering a .org domain name similar to the name of your secret underground site is a stupid and completely pointless thing to do.
- diminoten 12y ago
  They don't have to convince a jury it was Karpeles, just that it may not have been Ulbricht.
- CodeWriter23 12y ago
  And also the kind of mistake someone with poor opsec would make.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

adamnemecek 12y ago

Someone call Aaron Sorkin and David Fincher to get in on this.

ballpoint 12y ago
I'm sure they don't need calling. They'll be all over this...

mhurron 12y ago

He wasn't the real Dread Pirate Roberts either. The real Roberts has been retired fifteen years and living like a king in Patagonia.

taternuts 12y ago
Now that's an obscure reference
- mod 12y ago
  It doesn't seem so obscure after two people have made it in nearly identical lingo. That said, I have no idea what it references.
  - cheald 12y ago
    The "Dread Pirate Roberts" moniker is from a (wonderful) movie called "The Princess Bride". In it, the hero assumes the mantle of the "Dread Pirate Roberts", and is at least the fourth successor to the title. It's an interesting factor in this case, because the choice of name hints that the "Dread Pirate Roberts" handle was chosen so it could be passed from person to person. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHZGqBVBCRw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHZGqBVBCRw
    - gojomo 12y ago
      Notably also the judge has apparently admonished the jury not to watch The Princess Bride: https://twitter.com/sarahjeong/status/555847465128435712 https://twitter.com/sarahjeong/status/555847465128435712
      - cheald 12y ago
        That monster.
      - mhurron 12y ago
        Inconceivable.

jlrubin 12y ago

Breaking News: Mark Karpeles says that Ross Ulbricht is responsible for Mt. Gox theft, was actually the CEO of the the failed exchange the whole time. That said, this is actually a great defense.

danielweber 12y ago
It's one thing to falsely claim you didn't do it. It's another thing entirely to falsely claim someone else did it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistaken_identity#SODDI_Defense http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistaken_identity#SODDI_Defense
- tedunangst 12y ago
  Wikipedia doesn't cite any examples or references for the claim that it's illegal to blame somebody else. In the US, you have pretty wide latitude to say what you want in court. The closest example I can think of is Amanda Knox, who was prosecuted for slander for suggesting that the police investigators didn't do their job properly as part of her defense. That happened in Italy, however.
  - rnovak 12y ago
    It is by definition Slander/Defamation (depending on the medium) to make a provable statement against someone else without substantiation. Meaning, if you claim someone is AKA someone else, that is a provable statement. Saying someone is an asshole is not a provable statement. EFF has a good article on this[1], they call it a 'statement of fact'. From what I understand though, the defense was trying to IMPLY rather than outright, or rather, just bring up a reasonable alternate explanation. [1]https://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/liability/defamation https://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers/legal/liability/defamati... Edit: Seriously? It's an informative post, why the downvote hate?
    - x0x0 12y ago
      testimony in court and court filings is, as far as I know, absolutely privileged with respect to defamation -- even if it is false If for no other reason, this is necessary so that a trial doesn't devolve into an endless cycle of suit and counter-suit

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

jmtame 12y ago

Up next, Satoshi Nakamoto is revealed to be Mark Karpeles

jkeat 12y ago
well, http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com//2013/11/23/study-suggests-link-between-dread-pirate-roberts-and-satoshi-nakamoto/ http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com//2013/11/23/study-suggests-lin... but they later retracted their claim. http://www.businessinsider.com/silk-road-satoshi-paper-retraction-2013-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/silk-road-satoshi-paper-retra...
- markburns 12y ago
  Interesting point from the retraction article. > He says the account was randomly assigned to him by the Mt. Gox exchange So the suggestion that DPR is not Satoshi relates to evidence from Mt Gox.