11–20 of 94 posts
This is what it looks like when the system works. Society is safer with Ross behind bars.
It's terrible that we are doing this to someone who probably would have learned their lesson with only 5-10 years of prison and been able to return to society. He had the potential to return as a productive member of society and now instead he will be a lifelong debt all for assisting in the sale of drugs that people willingly purchased knowing the risk of death from those drugs. He's no saint but this punishment is…
Well, that and attempting to have multiple people killed.
I get that you're coming from ignorance and probably not malice, and I remember seeing the Article headlines too when it came out; but bro, it's Oct 2015 and we now know those charges are bullshit.
It's terrible that we are doing this to someone who probably would have learned their lesson with only 5-10 years of prison and been able to return to society. He had the potential to return as a productive member of society and now instead he will be a lifelong debt all for assisting in the sale of drugs that people willingly purchased knowing the risk of death from those drugs. He's no saint but this punishment is…
Well, that and attempting to have multiple people killed.
In my case, I was convicted of a crime that was for the physical theft and sale of circuit boards, had nothing to do with the Internet or hacking, and yet I was banned from the Internet upon my release from prison. This part of the sentence was out of the blue, and we had no opportunity to even prepare a defense for it (and in 1995, no one in the court room really knew what the Internet was except me and a few of my friends who attended the hearing). It's really fucked but it's their modus operandi.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The assassination stuff is disturbing, but it's not what he was sentenced for.
The sentencing transcript disagrees with you; the judge goes on for several pages about it. There's a really virulent meme that Ulbricht was never tried for the assassination scheme. But he was: the murder-for-hire scheme was a predicate on his "criminal conspiracy" charge. Not only was it brought up in trial, but it was brought up in a way that put the onus on the prosecution to prove it.
I just hope one day you face your karma. To be on the receiving end of your hatred/ignorance.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The sentencing transcript disagrees with you; the judge goes on for several pages about it. There's a really virulent meme that Ulbricht was never tried for the assassination scheme. But he was: the murder-for-hire scheme was a predicate on his "criminal conspiracy" charge. Not only was it brought up in trial, but it was brought up in a way that put the onus on the prosecution to prove it.
wow, I see now that you "actually" DO have some issue with Ross and want to paint the picture of him as a murderer. There is no point arguing the details with you, you'll never change your stance regardless of facts. I just hope one day you face your karma. To be on the receiving end of your hatred/ignorance.
So what exactly are you saying, that it wasn't talked about?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, that and attempting to have multiple people killed.
The problem is they didn't have to prove anything here. It's very common in federal court to plead and be convicted of one thing, and then they bring in all this other shit at sentencing. The burden at trial is "beyond a reasonable doubt", but the bar at sentencing is "preponderance of the evidence" I believe. And I don't buy it for a second that the judge thought about this sentence for 100 hours. Federal judges sen…
I do appreciate the color from your own experiences. It's certainly not my contention that sentencing is in general fair, or even that this particular sentence was fair. Certainly: sentencing for computer crimes is egregiously unfair.
But the Ulbricht trial gets past a lot of these issues. The judge notes:
* Ulbricht paid to have someone killed. He was told that person had a wife and child. Ulbricht paid anyways. The money was taken. There is no evidence he was role-playing.
* Later, Ulbricht paid to have someone else killed. The would-be assassins informed him that the target lived with 3 other people. Ulbricht paid extra to have those people killed too. The money was taken. There is no evidence he was role-playing.
At this point in the transcript, it's like: what do you think is going to happen?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, that and attempting to have multiple people killed.
this infuriates me whenever I see this "justification". Watch Deep Web Documentary ( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3312868/ ) . The corrupt FBI agents were the ones responsible for the fake hits, not Ross. I get that you're coming from ignorance and probably not malice, and I remember seeing the Article headlines too when it came out; but bro, it's Oct 2015 and we now know those charges are bullshit.
It's terrible that we are doing this to someone who probably would have learned their lesson with only 5-10 years of prison and been able to return to society. He had the potential to return as a productive member of society and now instead he will be a lifelong debt all for assisting in the sale of drugs that people willingly purchased knowing the risk of death from those drugs. He's no saint but this punishment is…
Well, that and attempting to have multiple people killed.
narcotics trafficking; distribution of narcotics by means of the Internet; narcotics trafficking conspiracy; continuing criminal enterprise; conspiracy to aid and abet computer hacking; conspiracy to traffic in fraudulent identity documents; and money laundering conspiracy.
notice that "attempting to have multiple people killed" is not something he was convicted of.
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I agree but if they also want to use the strict punishment to deter then it would probably have to be more than that.
What sentence would be sufficient, if 10 years isn't?
1-2 years seems about right.
You think about the very low barrier to starting a site like that up, and then you think about the kind of person likely to stumble into that scheme, and then what it would take to deter them and others from trying it, and it seems like you want enough of a sentence so that it's for real, but nothing more than that.
But for paying to have people killed? Life seems appropriate. Maybe, if you want to take a more Scandinavian approach to sentencing, you'd say "10-15 years". Long enough that the convict comes out of prison effectively living a different life than they were before. Enough to completely disrupt their previous connections.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The sentencing transcript disagrees with you; the judge goes on for several pages about it. There's a really virulent meme that Ulbricht was never tried for the assassination scheme. But he was: the murder-for-hire scheme was a predicate on his "criminal conspiracy" charge. Not only was it brought up in trial, but it was brought up in a way that put the onus on the prosecution to prove it.
wow, I see now that you "actually" DO have some issue with Ross and want to paint the picture of him as a murderer. There is no point arguing the details with you, you'll never change your stance regardless of facts. I just hope one day you face your karma. To be on the receiving end of your hatred/ignorance.