16 ms·

allegedly tried to have multiple people killed. The prosecution brought this up at trial but he was not charged or convicted of this in the criminal trial.

zanny 11y ago
This is the key point. He is going to spend the rest of his life in prison, pretty much, for running a website. Not for hurting anyone, not for even threatening to kill anyone - those charges weren't a part of his conviction - but simply by enabling the exchange of drugs he apparently should be locked away forever. Go Team 'Murica....
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
  He didn't just "enable the exchange of drugs". He knowingly hid that he did so, and made bucketloads of money off it.
  - psykovsky 11y ago
    What are those bucketloads worth when the only time you get to spend them are when you buy assassinations from dirty undercover DEA agents?
- tzs 11y ago
  Are you implying drugs don't hurt anyone? Even the most ardent proponent of full legalization usually acknowledges that many drugs are very harmful--they just believe the people should be free to do things even if they are harmful to themselves. I generally support decriminalization or even legalization, but I would be reluctant to allow internet sales. I'd require sales to be through licensed dealers and in person, so that an addict cannot completely cut themselves off from human contact. Internet sales make drugs too easy.
  - fleitz 11y ago
    No more than water does. Even as a proponent of full legalization I know that as little as a few minutes spent in water can kill someone, and often does. Why people are allowed to casually dive into this toxic substance is beyond me. No licenses, no regulations, practically any body of water you can find you're allowed to jump into totally unsupervised. Most places don't even have signs warning people of the danger, and worst yet, many children practice a dangerous activity called 'swimming' in this substance often daring each other as to who can drop the highest from a rope into a potentially fatal body of water. Also, once you start drinking it you need to find at least 4 litres of this a day to keep from going into water withdrawl, commonly known as dehydration, this can happen in as little as 3 days with out your daily fix.
    - TeMPOraL 11y ago
      There's a difference in degree and in kind. Water does not create addiction that forces you to consume it in amounts that are seriously harmful to your health. It's not true that areas unsafe for swimming are not marked - they are; moreover, there's both infrastructure in place to increase safety (e.g. lifeguards) and a significant amount of effort put towards educating people about the dangers of things like jumping into the water in a potentially unsafe place. But that's all beside the point. Laws and rules do not exist in vacuum, and humans are not spherical cows of uniform density. Time and again history has proven that most people can handle exposure to water safely, while they can't handle being exposed to hard drugs. You can blame this on individual stupidity, but people don't have perfectly free will, and if this stupidity predictably touches big fractions of a population, it's time to mitigate it.
      - itistoday2 11y ago
        > There's a difference in degree and in kind. Water does not create addiction that forces you to consume it in amounts that are seriously harmful to your health. Neither do most drugs, especially most illegal drugs. Many legal drugs do (the most addictive of all being nicotine), but that also doesn't matter and is besides the point. These are health issues, not criminal issues.
      - deleted 11y ago
  - civilian 11y ago
    Licensed & regulated dealers (aka pharmacies) would be great. In regards to the harm from drugs-- I'd add the obvious point that prohibition comes with a really high cost. I recently did dry-january and I was really happy with the results of cutting back on my drinking. I wake up more rested, and had more energy in the evenings. I've been thinking that going totally dry might be a good thing to do in my life. But would I make alcohol, one of the top killers in america, illegal? (ref: http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/alcohol-use.htm http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/alcohol-use.htm ) Absolutely not. If you went to US high school you know why--- alcohol-dealing gangs took over. People turned to bad products (wood alcohol, that potentially included methanol) to get their alcohol fix. I imagine we needlessly jailed a lot of alcohol drinkers and pushers. A more indepth analysis of alcohol prohibition: http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-157.html http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-157.html Why does the general public consider drug prohibition to be that much different than alcohol prohibition??
    - tluyben2 11y ago
      Not sure why people and especially lawmakers keep separating alcohol and other drugs. Alcohol is a drug and one of the more dangerous and addictive ones at that. If that is legal than so should a lot of other drugs be. And trying to make it illegal, as you say does not work; it makes it things worse.
    - krylon 11y ago
      > Why does the general public consider drug prohibition to be that much different than alcohol prohibition?? Because they have been told by the media, over and over, for decades. At least that's my theory. Consider how often the phrase "drugs and alcohol" is used in the general context of substance-based addiction. Because it is socially accepted. Being a connoisseur of fine wines or whiskey is something many people consider sophisticated. Being a connoisseur of, say psychedelics or stimulants is, apparently a criminal offense.
      - jensen123 11y ago
        My theory is that the media tells people what they want to hear, in order to sell the most papers, page impressions etc. If they told stuff that the general public disagreed with, then they would probably lose readers/viewers. Alcohol has a long tradition in the western civilization, so people feel somewhat comfortable with that. Other drugs probably seem very new and scary to the average guy.
  - itistoday2 11y ago
    > Are you implying drugs don't hurt anyone? Drugs, like spoons, hurt people. Some other items that kill people include: Cars. Motorcycles. Trees. Water. Too much air. Too little air. People. Dogs. Sticks. Bath tubs. Guns. In the end, drugs are no more inherently harmful than any of the items listed above. What usually kills people, however, is not drugs, but things associated with drugs that exist only because we have decided they should exist: - Drug gangs and cartels and the violence associated with them are the product of US government policy, not drugs. - Drug overdoses are the product of US government policy, not drugs (in most cases), because especially with illegal drugs people don't know what they're getting or how much of it or how to use it. It is primarily we that kill people. Look around you. If you see a face that supports the drug war, that person is partially guilty in all drug related deaths. The irony of this case is that Judge Katherine Forrest is now much more responsible for the drug-related deaths she is trying to prevent.
    - mpyne 11y ago
      Yeah, I remember reading news stories all the time about how Canadians overdose on maple syrup or how Egyptians overdose on water. Truly, all drugs are just as innocuous as air and puppies.
    - pkinsky 11y ago
      >Yeah, I remember reading news stories all the time about how Canadians overdose on maple syrup or how Egyptians overdose on water. Truly, all drugs are just as innocuous as air and puppies. Maple syrup may not have been a good example http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-basics/statistics http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-basics/statistics
      - itistoday2 11y ago
        I think you meant to reply to mpyne, but that is a very amusing observation. :)
      - vacri 11y ago
        Nice rejoinder to 'Canadians overdose on maple syrup' - a page about a generic disease that never mentions maple syrup nor Canadians, nor dosage. Here is an in-kind rebuttal to your link: http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-like-turtles http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-like-turtles
  - homulilly 11y ago
    Cars and guns also hurt people but pretty much anyone can sell those. I agree that drug sales should be regulated but that doesn't in any way make sentencing someone to life in prison for running a website any less fucked up.
    - timsally 11y ago
      > Cars and guns also hurt people but pretty much anyone can sell those. The following applies only to the US. Since 1968 you need a license granted by the federal government to sell guns (https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/who-can-obtain-federal-firearms-license-ffl https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/who-can-obtain-federal-firea...). The law allowing you to carry a firearm was passed in 1791. Driver's licenses have been around since 1899. You can't sell a car to someone without one. When thinking about this issue, I've found the following thought experiments useful: (1) Should someone who ran a multi-million dollar illegal gun operation get life in prison, even though unlike drugs, the right to own firearms is explicitly protected by the Constitution? (2) Should someone who ran a multi-million dollar website selling only weed in legal venues (Colorado, etc) be convicted of any crime, never-mind sentenced to life in prison, even though it is against federal law? Personally I answer (1) as YES and (2) as NO, and place Ulbricht's conduct significantly closer to (1) than to (2).
      - jsmthrowaway 11y ago
        That dichotomy is clever, almost convincing, and plainly obvious in its manipulative structure.
        Zancarius 11y ago
        I'd greatly appreciate if you could elaborate, because I'm finding myself confused as to what you're getting at, and I have no idea which point you're addressing. I think I follow, but I'm not convinced my interpretation is correct. Honestly, I can't tell if this block is because I'm conflating the context of the greater discussion (the Ulbricht trial) with the more nuanced points of timsally's comment. Thanks!
        11y ago
  - timsally 11y ago
    Do you apply this logic to alcohol as well? It's a drug and there are many addicts, so similar to other drugs I don't think it should be sold online. Where do you come down on that? I only ask because many people implicitly omit alcohol when discussing drugs, even though it is one.
    - tzs 11y ago
      I'd be reluctant to allow it, just like with other drugs. As with other drugs, if it can be shown that a particular drug is not overly addicting, then I'd be fine with that drug being sold online (but only from licensed and regulated dealers, with enforced quality standards). So, online beer would probably turn out to be OK, as would online marijuana. Cigarettes are an interesting case. Nicotine is pretty high up on the addicting list, but experimentally even heavy smokers don't seem to consumer so much that they ruin their lives the way, say, a heroin addict might. Probably because cigarettes don't really impair your functionality. So probably they should be allowed online.
  - akshatpradhan 11y ago
    If drugs hurt people, it should be treated as a medical issue and not a criminal issue.
  - mkramlich 11y ago
    from the historical record I'm pretty sure that the USA gov has caused/allowed more drugs/chemicals/radiation/weapons to cause more harm/deaths to innocent/civilian people than Ross ever has. I don't see any US President or Senator, etc., in jail, because of that. example: drop tons of Agent Orange on the lands/people of Vietnam? Just an oopsie! and they move on, wipe their hands clean. People dead and children deformed. Oopsie! Our mistake. Next meeting.
    - iyn 11y ago
      Exactly. What about "There must be no doubt that no one is above the law"? Every time I learn more about history, politics etc I'm more and more frustrated. The system/law doesn't work the way it is presented and people/institutions that are "in charge" have an incentive to left it the way it is (otherwise 50% of them should be in jail). Any ideas what can we do? I like projects that try to give more power to the people (like DemocracyOS), but I think it's rather kind of a bugfix for a badly designed system - it's important to try to improve it to keep it somehow working in the short term, yet (IMO) the whole architecture is broken and won't work in the long term when everything changes so fast...
  - vegedor 11y ago
    Guns don't kill people, people do. The place wasn't only used for drugs, but mostly, sure. The drugs aren't harmful, harm is an abstract term for a process that hurts. The process in question is the abuse of drugs. The selling of drugs by itself doesn't cause direct harm.
  - baddox 11y ago
    Drugs don't do anywhere near as much harm as drug prohibition.
- eeeeeeeeeeeee 11y ago
  Give me a break. I also think the punishment was excessively harsh (the murder-for-hire stuff likely played a role even though he was not convicted on that), but saying he is getting life in prison for "running a website" is a huge oversimplification of the ruling. That being said, I think this is the federal government showing, through the courts, how terrified they are of people running things they cannot control. Bitcoin terrifies them. They want to send a very clear message.
Alupis 11y ago
The people supposedly "murdered" never existed... the names did not belong to real people, nor did the photo id's match anyone of record, etc. It's a rumor that they were Fed baiting him... and likely why the Fed never tried to charge him on the murder-for-hire counts.
- redthrowaway 11y ago
  You can still be charged with soliticing a minor if you happen to be a star on To Catch a Predator. Just because the minor in question never existed doesn't mean it's not a crime.
  - themeek 11y ago
    Is it not known as entrapment to present a false situation in order to get a conviction or indictment, even if it's to confirm on behalf of the target a tendency or willingness to participate in the activity were to be real - and illegal because of its implications for abuse and its lack of real damage?
    - GreenCarnation 11y ago
      Nope. Entrapment requires the police to have caused someone to commit a crime they wouldn't have otherwise. A good explanation of what counts as entrapment: http://thecriminallawyer.tumblr.com/post/19810672629/12-i-was-entrapped http://thecriminallawyer.tumblr.com/post/19810672629/12-i-wa...
      - themeek 11y ago
        I'm not sure I really follow because the comics didn't describe anything that presumably would be entrapment. Is anyone here a lawyer in this area of law? I don't really trust webcomics.... But let's talk about this alleged hitman situation. Didn't the police come up with the idea and create the situation where a third of a million dollars appeared to have been stolen and a volunteer appeared to defect with information and a threat to bring down the organization? What exactly does count as coercion? If the police were to make your incentives work out a certain way - let's say they were aware that a non-call-girl was in dire straights was potentially willing to accept money for a personal night, they freeze her bank account and provide a good looking and safe opportunity with a load of cash to do it - would that count as compulsion? Or is it just by appeal to words that counts as compulsion? How can a court decide what you would have done otherwise? It seems like a pretty difficult area of law - and one that the defendant could argue? For the record I do not support trafficking of drugs and illegal materials, nor calling of hit men: but I do want to make sure that the tools to get a conviction do not further enshrine precedents that have fascistic qualities to them - e.g. parallel construction, entrapment, others.
Natsu 11y ago
There was an interesting link posted by tptacek about this - https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1391926/gov-uscourts-nysd-422824-142-0.pdf https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1391... - where the Court offers their view on this: "As explained above, the murder-for-hire evidence is probative both as evidence of the charged offenses and to prove Ulbricht’s identity as DPR—a key disputed issue in this case. In addition, the charges in this case are extremely serious: Ulbricht is charged not with participating in a run-of-the-mill drug distribution conspiracy, but with designing and operating an online criminal enterprise of enormous scope, worldwide reach, and capacity to generate tens of millions of dollars in commissions."
- mdpopescu 11y ago
  He was stopped too soon; if he'd have earned billions he'd have been "too big to fail" and given bail money.
deciplex 11y ago
Eh, the evidence for it does seem pretty damning, even accounting for the fact that Ulbricht hasn't had the opportunity to defend himself (although, given the showing at the actual trial, perhaps he's better off). I would bet that he's guilty, though not even at 2:1 odds. That's not to say that, strictly speaking, this isn't a miscarriage of justice - it is. No one should be in prison merely for selling drugs or facilitating the sale of drugs. But, Ross Ulbricht is likely a danger to society.
bedhead 11y ago
Solicitation is a serious crime in itself.

zanny 11y ago

This is the key point. He is going to spend the rest of his life in prison, pretty much, for running a website. Not for hurting anyone, not for even threatening to kill anyone - those charges weren't a part of his conviction - but simply by enabling the exchange of drugs he apparently should be locked away forever. Go Team 'Murica....

TazeTSchnitzel 11y ago
He didn't just "enable the exchange of drugs". He knowingly hid that he did so, and made bucketloads of money off it.
- psykovsky 11y ago
  What are those bucketloads worth when the only time you get to spend them are when you buy assassinations from dirty undercover DEA agents?
tzs 11y ago
Are you implying drugs don't hurt anyone? Even the most ardent proponent of full legalization usually acknowledges that many drugs are very harmful--they just believe the people should be free to do things even if they are harmful to themselves. I generally support decriminalization or even legalization, but I would be reluctant to allow internet sales. I'd require sales to be through licensed dealers and in person, so that an addict cannot completely cut themselves off from human contact. Internet sales make drugs too easy.
- fleitz 11y ago
  No more than water does. Even as a proponent of full legalization I know that as little as a few minutes spent in water can kill someone, and often does. Why people are allowed to casually dive into this toxic substance is beyond me. No licenses, no regulations, practically any body of water you can find you're allowed to jump into totally unsupervised. Most places don't even have signs warning people of the danger, and worst yet, many children practice a dangerous activity called 'swimming' in this substance often daring each other as to who can drop the highest from a rope into a potentially fatal body of water. Also, once you start drinking it you need to find at least 4 litres of this a day to keep from going into water withdrawl, commonly known as dehydration, this can happen in as little as 3 days with out your daily fix.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    There's a difference in degree and in kind. Water does not create addiction that forces you to consume it in amounts that are seriously harmful to your health. It's not true that areas unsafe for swimming are not marked - they are; moreover, there's both infrastructure in place to increase safety (e.g. lifeguards) and a significant amount of effort put towards educating people about the dangers of things like jumping into the water in a potentially unsafe place. But that's all beside the point. Laws and rules do not exist in vacuum, and humans are not spherical cows of uniform density. Time and again history has proven that most people can handle exposure to water safely, while they can't handle being exposed to hard drugs. You can blame this on individual stupidity, but people don't have perfectly free will, and if this stupidity predictably touches big fractions of a population, it's time to mitigate it.
    - itistoday2 11y ago
      > There's a difference in degree and in kind. Water does not create addiction that forces you to consume it in amounts that are seriously harmful to your health. Neither do most drugs, especially most illegal drugs. Many legal drugs do (the most addictive of all being nicotine), but that also doesn't matter and is besides the point. These are health issues, not criminal issues.
    - deleted 11y ago
- civilian 11y ago
  Licensed & regulated dealers (aka pharmacies) would be great. In regards to the harm from drugs-- I'd add the obvious point that prohibition comes with a really high cost. I recently did dry-january and I was really happy with the results of cutting back on my drinking. I wake up more rested, and had more energy in the evenings. I've been thinking that going totally dry might be a good thing to do in my life. But would I make alcohol, one of the top killers in america, illegal? (ref: http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/alcohol-use.htm http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/alcohol-use.htm ) Absolutely not. If you went to US high school you know why--- alcohol-dealing gangs took over. People turned to bad products (wood alcohol, that potentially included methanol) to get their alcohol fix. I imagine we needlessly jailed a lot of alcohol drinkers and pushers. A more indepth analysis of alcohol prohibition: http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-157.html http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-157.html Why does the general public consider drug prohibition to be that much different than alcohol prohibition??
  - tluyben2 11y ago
    Not sure why people and especially lawmakers keep separating alcohol and other drugs. Alcohol is a drug and one of the more dangerous and addictive ones at that. If that is legal than so should a lot of other drugs be. And trying to make it illegal, as you say does not work; it makes it things worse.
  - krylon 11y ago
    > Why does the general public consider drug prohibition to be that much different than alcohol prohibition?? Because they have been told by the media, over and over, for decades. At least that's my theory. Consider how often the phrase "drugs and alcohol" is used in the general context of substance-based addiction. Because it is socially accepted. Being a connoisseur of fine wines or whiskey is something many people consider sophisticated. Being a connoisseur of, say psychedelics or stimulants is, apparently a criminal offense.
    - jensen123 11y ago
      My theory is that the media tells people what they want to hear, in order to sell the most papers, page impressions etc. If they told stuff that the general public disagreed with, then they would probably lose readers/viewers. Alcohol has a long tradition in the western civilization, so people feel somewhat comfortable with that. Other drugs probably seem very new and scary to the average guy.
- itistoday2 11y ago
  > Are you implying drugs don't hurt anyone? Drugs, like spoons, hurt people. Some other items that kill people include: Cars. Motorcycles. Trees. Water. Too much air. Too little air. People. Dogs. Sticks. Bath tubs. Guns. In the end, drugs are no more inherently harmful than any of the items listed above. What usually kills people, however, is not drugs, but things associated with drugs that exist only because we have decided they should exist: - Drug gangs and cartels and the violence associated with them are the product of US government policy, not drugs. - Drug overdoses are the product of US government policy, not drugs (in most cases), because especially with illegal drugs people don't know what they're getting or how much of it or how to use it. It is primarily we that kill people. Look around you. If you see a face that supports the drug war, that person is partially guilty in all drug related deaths. The irony of this case is that Judge Katherine Forrest is now much more responsible for the drug-related deaths she is trying to prevent.
  - mpyne 11y ago
    Yeah, I remember reading news stories all the time about how Canadians overdose on maple syrup or how Egyptians overdose on water. Truly, all drugs are just as innocuous as air and puppies.
  - pkinsky 11y ago
    >Yeah, I remember reading news stories all the time about how Canadians overdose on maple syrup or how Egyptians overdose on water. Truly, all drugs are just as innocuous as air and puppies. Maple syrup may not have been a good example http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-basics/statistics http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-basics/statistics
    - itistoday2 11y ago
      I think you meant to reply to mpyne, but that is a very amusing observation. :)
    - vacri 11y ago
      Nice rejoinder to 'Canadians overdose on maple syrup' - a page about a generic disease that never mentions maple syrup nor Canadians, nor dosage. Here is an in-kind rebuttal to your link: http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-like-turtles http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-like-turtles
- homulilly 11y ago
  Cars and guns also hurt people but pretty much anyone can sell those. I agree that drug sales should be regulated but that doesn't in any way make sentencing someone to life in prison for running a website any less fucked up.
  - timsally 11y ago
    > Cars and guns also hurt people but pretty much anyone can sell those. The following applies only to the US. Since 1968 you need a license granted by the federal government to sell guns (https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/who-can-obtain-federal-firearms-license-ffl https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/who-can-obtain-federal-firea...). The law allowing you to carry a firearm was passed in 1791. Driver's licenses have been around since 1899. You can't sell a car to someone without one. When thinking about this issue, I've found the following thought experiments useful: (1) Should someone who ran a multi-million dollar illegal gun operation get life in prison, even though unlike drugs, the right to own firearms is explicitly protected by the Constitution? (2) Should someone who ran a multi-million dollar website selling only weed in legal venues (Colorado, etc) be convicted of any crime, never-mind sentenced to life in prison, even though it is against federal law? Personally I answer (1) as YES and (2) as NO, and place Ulbricht's conduct significantly closer to (1) than to (2).
    - jsmthrowaway 11y ago
      That dichotomy is clever, almost convincing, and plainly obvious in its manipulative structure.
      - Zancarius 11y ago
        I'd greatly appreciate if you could elaborate, because I'm finding myself confused as to what you're getting at, and I have no idea which point you're addressing. I think I follow, but I'm not convinced my interpretation is correct. Honestly, I can't tell if this block is because I'm conflating the context of the greater discussion (the Ulbricht trial) with the more nuanced points of timsally's comment. Thanks!
      - 11y ago
- timsally 11y ago
  Do you apply this logic to alcohol as well? It's a drug and there are many addicts, so similar to other drugs I don't think it should be sold online. Where do you come down on that? I only ask because many people implicitly omit alcohol when discussing drugs, even though it is one.
  - tzs 11y ago
    I'd be reluctant to allow it, just like with other drugs. As with other drugs, if it can be shown that a particular drug is not overly addicting, then I'd be fine with that drug being sold online (but only from licensed and regulated dealers, with enforced quality standards). So, online beer would probably turn out to be OK, as would online marijuana. Cigarettes are an interesting case. Nicotine is pretty high up on the addicting list, but experimentally even heavy smokers don't seem to consumer so much that they ruin their lives the way, say, a heroin addict might. Probably because cigarettes don't really impair your functionality. So probably they should be allowed online.
- akshatpradhan 11y ago
  If drugs hurt people, it should be treated as a medical issue and not a criminal issue.
- mkramlich 11y ago
  from the historical record I'm pretty sure that the USA gov has caused/allowed more drugs/chemicals/radiation/weapons to cause more harm/deaths to innocent/civilian people than Ross ever has. I don't see any US President or Senator, etc., in jail, because of that. example: drop tons of Agent Orange on the lands/people of Vietnam? Just an oopsie! and they move on, wipe their hands clean. People dead and children deformed. Oopsie! Our mistake. Next meeting.
  - iyn 11y ago
    Exactly. What about "There must be no doubt that no one is above the law"? Every time I learn more about history, politics etc I'm more and more frustrated. The system/law doesn't work the way it is presented and people/institutions that are "in charge" have an incentive to left it the way it is (otherwise 50% of them should be in jail). Any ideas what can we do? I like projects that try to give more power to the people (like DemocracyOS), but I think it's rather kind of a bugfix for a badly designed system - it's important to try to improve it to keep it somehow working in the short term, yet (IMO) the whole architecture is broken and won't work in the long term when everything changes so fast...
- vegedor 11y ago
  Guns don't kill people, people do. The place wasn't only used for drugs, but mostly, sure. The drugs aren't harmful, harm is an abstract term for a process that hurts. The process in question is the abuse of drugs. The selling of drugs by itself doesn't cause direct harm.
- baddox 11y ago
  Drugs don't do anywhere near as much harm as drug prohibition.
eeeeeeeeeeeee 11y ago
Give me a break. I also think the punishment was excessively harsh (the murder-for-hire stuff likely played a role even though he was not convicted on that), but saying he is getting life in prison for "running a website" is a huge oversimplification of the ruling. That being said, I think this is the federal government showing, through the courts, how terrified they are of people running things they cannot control. Bitcoin terrifies them. They want to send a very clear message.

Alupis 11y ago

The people supposedly "murdered" never existed... the names did not belong to real people, nor did the photo id's match anyone of record, etc. It's a rumor that they were Fed baiting him... and likely why the Fed never tried to charge him on the murder-for-hire counts.

redthrowaway 11y ago
You can still be charged with soliticing a minor if you happen to be a star on To Catch a Predator. Just because the minor in question never existed doesn't mean it's not a crime.
- themeek 11y ago
  Is it not known as entrapment to present a false situation in order to get a conviction or indictment, even if it's to confirm on behalf of the target a tendency or willingness to participate in the activity were to be real - and illegal because of its implications for abuse and its lack of real damage?
  - GreenCarnation 11y ago
    Nope. Entrapment requires the police to have caused someone to commit a crime they wouldn't have otherwise. A good explanation of what counts as entrapment: http://thecriminallawyer.tumblr.com/post/19810672629/12-i-was-entrapped http://thecriminallawyer.tumblr.com/post/19810672629/12-i-wa...
    - themeek 11y ago
      I'm not sure I really follow because the comics didn't describe anything that presumably would be entrapment. Is anyone here a lawyer in this area of law? I don't really trust webcomics.... But let's talk about this alleged hitman situation. Didn't the police come up with the idea and create the situation where a third of a million dollars appeared to have been stolen and a volunteer appeared to defect with information and a threat to bring down the organization? What exactly does count as coercion? If the police were to make your incentives work out a certain way - let's say they were aware that a non-call-girl was in dire straights was potentially willing to accept money for a personal night, they freeze her bank account and provide a good looking and safe opportunity with a load of cash to do it - would that count as compulsion? Or is it just by appeal to words that counts as compulsion? How can a court decide what you would have done otherwise? It seems like a pretty difficult area of law - and one that the defendant could argue? For the record I do not support trafficking of drugs and illegal materials, nor calling of hit men: but I do want to make sure that the tools to get a conviction do not further enshrine precedents that have fascistic qualities to them - e.g. parallel construction, entrapment, others.

Natsu 11y ago

There was an interesting link posted by tptacek about this - https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1391926/gov-uscourts-nysd-422824-142-0.pdf https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1391... - where the Court offers their view on this: "As explained above, the murder-for-hire evidence is probative both as evidence of the charged offenses and to prove Ulbricht’s identity as DPR—a key disputed issue in this case. In addition, the charges in this case are extremely serious: Ulbricht is charged not with participating in a run-of-the-mill drug distribution conspiracy, but with designing and operating an online criminal enterprise of enormous scope, worldwide reach, and capacity to generate tens of millions of dollars in commissions."

mdpopescu 11y ago
He was stopped too soon; if he'd have earned billions he'd have been "too big to fail" and given bail money.

deciplex 11y ago

Eh, the evidence for it does seem pretty damning, even accounting for the fact that Ulbricht hasn't had the opportunity to defend himself (although, given the showing at the actual trial, perhaps he's better off). I would bet that he's guilty, though not even at 2:1 odds. That's not to say that, strictly speaking, this isn't a miscarriage of justice - it is. No one should be in prison merely for selling drugs or facilitating the sale of drugs. But, Ross Ulbricht is likely a danger to society.

bedhead 11y ago

Solicitation is a serious crime in itself.