Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence • Hacker News Board

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#41

Post by trhway » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 10:51 PM UTC

clamprecht wrote: post #24

tptacek wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not true. The murder-for-hire scheme wasn't simply "related conduct": it was also a predicate of the conspiracy charge, which had to sustain a "reasonable doubt" standard at trial, and a sentencing accelerator that met a "preponderance of evidence" standard during sentencing. Both are discussed in the transcript. I do appreciate the color from your own experiences. It's certainly not my contention that sentenc…

Ok, then I was misinformed on Ross's case, if he was convicted for the murder conspiracy. I don't know first-hand what happened in his case. I do know first-hand what happened in my case (and in many of cases of friends) where the US Attorney (the prosecutor) misled the court or outright lied, or had a witness lie, to get the defendant a higher sentence. They do it so routinely that it casts doubt on all cases now (f…

>if he was convicted for the murder conspiracy

he wasn't. Alleged murders, without ever being tried before court, were used to cause sentence enhancement. All the "evidence" and "testimony" for the murder charges weren't even enough to sustain the charges, less bring them for trial. At the time of the conviction, it wasn't known that the agents were corrupt and thus, not surprisingly, the Judge gave their testimonies all the possible weight and came down that hard on the Ulbricht.

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#42

Post by ubernostrum » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 10:54 PM UTC

FireBeyond wrote: post #21

rsacco wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Oh, come on. From Alex Winter: "Silk Road Was Just Another Tech Company Outside of the tech press, Winter notes, a lot of the media coverage on the Silk Road has been “drugs and guns and hitmen—just wildly off-base.” Off-base, he says, because when he started interviewing the people who knew Silk Road he didn’t see an outfit that was all that different from those littering Silicon Valley. “I started to meet all these…

Ross was a sweet innocent boy who'd never ever hurt anyone, and who only wanted to implement a golden age of Libertopia by freeing people from the oppressive yoke of laws. Y'know, like laws against having other people killed in exchange for money.

The more I read about the guy, the more the root of the word "privilege" seems appropriate (i.e., private law -- he wanted one generous and lax law for him, and another violent and harsh law for the people who got in his way).

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#43

Post by superkuh » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 10:56 PM UTC

slg wrote: post #33

stormcrowsx wrote: post #3

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…

I think the judge addressed that issue. >"No drug dealer from the Bronx selling meth or heroin or crack has ever made these kinds of arguments to the Court. It is a privileged argument, it is an argument from one of privilege. You are no better a person than any other drug dealer and your education does not give you a special place of privilege in our criminal justice system. It makes it less explicable why you did w…

Except he didn't sell drugs at all. He ran a marketplace.

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#44

Post by joesmo » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 10:59 PM UTC

Judge: "So, harm reduction focused on the user is missing the point."

I think the judge is missing the point here, the point being an understanding of harm reduction and apparently, surprisingly the effects of drugs on society. No wonder she gave him life. She doesn't even understand what "harm reduction" is. The rest was just nonsense.

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#45

Post by dreamfactory2 » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 11:02 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #19

clamprecht wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What sentence would be sufficient, if 10 years isn't?

Simply for running a drug market, with no additional criminal conduct? Just the nuts-and-bolts of running the site, setting up Tor, taking money, that kind of stuff? 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…

hmm running a drugs market is a criminal conspiracy so I'd imagine a high number for that alone, quite apart from the deaths of users. not sure if his defence team were more inept or desperate from the article

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#46

Post by superplussed » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 11:06 PM UTC

This quote of the judge as he delivering his verdict is so crazy (he is reading from Ulbricht's journal):

Two days later on April 8 you write: "Sent payments to angel for hit on Tony76 and his three associates. Began setting up hecho as standby" -- I have no idea what that is -- "refactored main and category pages to be more efficient."

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#47

Post by trhway » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 11:19 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #9

Strom wrote: post #8

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.

>There's a really virulent meme that Ulbricht was never tried for the assassination scheme.

nice choice of words - "tried" instead of "convicted" :)

>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.

not true. The Judge clearly states that assassinations come through on "preponderance of evidence" which is a lower standard from "beyond reasonable doubt" the prosecution must prove for a trial and conviction. There is absolutely no surprise that a testimony from a [still unknown to be corrupt] federal agent met the "preponderance of evidence" threshold.

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#48

Post by mikeyouse » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 11:23 PM UTC

superkuh wrote: post #43

slg wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the judge addressed that issue. >"No drug dealer from the Bronx selling meth or heroin or crack has ever made these kinds of arguments to the Court. It is a privileged argument, it is an argument from one of privilege. You are no better a person than any other drug dealer and your education does not give you a special place of privilege in our criminal justice system. It makes it less explicable why you did w…

Except he didn't sell drugs at all. He ran a marketplace.

Untrue.. The first several pounds of shrooms on the Silk Road were grown and sold by Ulbricht. He claims credit for "Several Kilograms" in his diary.. Several kilos is well into the tens of thousands of dollars range..

http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-what-the-fbi-found-on-r...

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#49

Post by mikeyouse » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 11:26 PM UTC

trhway wrote: post #47

tptacek wrote: post #9

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.

>There's a really virulent meme that Ulbricht was never tried for the assassination scheme. nice choice of words - "tried" instead of "convicted" :) >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. not true. The Judge clearly states that assassinations come…

There was absolutely no testimony from Carl Mark Force or Shawn Bridges during the trial... Everyone involved (Judge, Defense, Prosecution) knew that charges against the two corrupt agents were coming down the line but they were directed to not mention it since the judge deemed that DEA completed their investigation completely independently of evidence gathered by the two. This is one of the reasons Ulbricht's lawyer kept expressing his outrage and promising a retrial.

This is also why they only accused Ross of 5 hits instead of 6 (The 6th was the one setup by the corrupt agents).

Re: Unsealed Transcript Shows How a Judge Justified Ross Ulbricht's Life Sentence

#50

Post by trhway » Mon, Oct 05, 2015, 11:35 PM UTC

mikeyouse wrote: post #49

trhway wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There's a really virulent meme that Ulbricht was never tried for the assassination scheme. nice choice of words - "tried" instead of "convicted" :) >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. not true. The Judge clearly states that assassinations come…

There was absolutely no testimony from Carl Mark Force or Shawn Bridges during the trial... Everyone involved (Judge, Defense, Prosecution) knew that charges against the two corrupt agents were coming down the line but they were directed to not mention it since the judge deemed that DEA completed their investigation completely independently of evidence gathered by the two. This is one of the reasons Ulbricht's lawyer…

>This is why they only accused Ross of 5 hits instead of 6 (The 6th was the one setup by the corrupt agents).

man, we're in different Universes. They dropped 5 charges out of 6 and the 6th has made it only as far as an indictment (in Maryland) completely based on the Force's testimony. And that indictment was used as the reason to deny bail and poisoned the rest of the trial.