Alleged Silk Road drug kingpin denies charges • Hacker News Board

Re: Alleged Silk Road drug kingpin denies charges

#61

Post by fnordfnordfnord » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 1:15 PM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #60

fnordfnordfnord wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You presume the assets to be the proceeds of a massive online narcotics market.

I do, because the narcotics market is the only source of assets that anyone has mentioned in conjunction with this person.

If his Forbes interview is to be believed, he apparently had accumulated enough BTC to buy out the original creator of SR. If not, then it still isn't a stretch to believe that a person whose involvement with Bitcoin goes back years, has accumulated a few BTC through mining, trading, or some other activity. Nor is it impossible for any other person who could be mistakenly identified as connected to SR to have accumulated a large amount of BTC through legal means.

Re: Alleged Silk Road drug kingpin denies charges

#62

Post by fnordfnordfnord » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 1:20 PM UTC

jtbigwoo wrote: post #49

jlgreco wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would careful accounting actually help in practice ? I don't imagine they would be all to impressed with your careful bookkeeping.

Criminals often employ people to keep their "legitimate" earnings separate from their criminal earnings. Whitey Bulger had lawyers and accountants working for decades to shuttle money into real estate and mundane businesses so he could keep it out of the government's hands. In Bulger's case, the government is trying to seize the money now that he's been caught and convicted, but it's not yet a sure thing that they'll…

So, the more sophisticated a criminal enterprise, the more likely that the defendant(s) will have a fair chance to defend themselves!

Re: Alleged Silk Road drug kingpin denies charges

#63

Post by mistercow » Sat, Oct 05, 2013, 3:03 PM UTC

refurb wrote: post #46

mistercow wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So in this case he probably is DPR and probably is guilty of at least most of what he's accused of. But because they don't have to prove guilt before seizing assets, they could easily just grab some random person, say "You ran this online drug ring, so we're seizing all of your assets" and then leave you with a public defender. And that's pretty messed up. It's also messed up that being stuck with a public defender i…

I'm not going to argue that the asset forfeiture laws in the US are completely fair, but that's not how it works. First off, you can't just arrest anyone without going in front of a judge and getting an arrest warrant (unless of course a police officer has evidence you committed a crime). Second, they need to identify your assets and then prove that they are proceeds from illegal activities. Do they just say "all of…

Yes, it is more complicated than simply arresting someone and taking all of their stuff, but it's not right to say that they need to "prove that they are proceeds from illegal activities". Proving that you are involved with illegal activities is what a trial is for. If you haven't been tried yet, they haven't proven anything.