As for "murder for hire": he was never charged with it. Why?! Why on earth prosecutors have chosen not to throw a book on a guy? Because it never happened. Whole "murder for hire" story is just a part of smear campaign.
Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
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Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#52As for "murder for hire": he was never charged with it. Why?! Why on earth prosecutors have chosen not to throw a book on a guy? Because it never happened. Whole "murder for hire" story is just a part of smear campaign.
Well, the other possibility is that there isn't enough proof. But IMO if there isn't enough proof, he's not guilty, and they shouldn't even mention it, to avoid damaging his public perception.
Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
>the libertarian ideals that justify the existence of Silk Road should have their day in court Real trials don't play out like they do in hollywood. You don't get to spend your time in court talking about your ideology and lobbying for better laws. The entire trial will be about whether or not he's guilty of breaking the laws that already exist.
You're missing my point: I don't want him to stand up in court and lecture on the nature of freedom and personal responsibility like something out of Inherit The Wind , I would just like to see him take the rap for what he (probably) did without this silly "it was the one armed man" defense. It's not about the trial, because the trial is lost no matter what he does (regardless of whether or not he's innocent, he's go…
So you want him to be a martyr? With the murder for hire accusations I doubt it...
Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#54As for "murder for hire": he was never charged with it. Why?! Why on earth prosecutors have chosen not to throw a book on a guy? Because it never happened. Whole "murder for hire" story is just a part of smear campaign.
Did you read the indictment? Do you think they just blatantly made up the dialogues and diary entries there? It seems unlikely they would risk doing that just to spice up what already seems like an open-and-shut case.
Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
>the libertarian ideals that justify the existence of Silk Road should have their day in court Real trials don't play out like they do in hollywood. You don't get to spend your time in court talking about your ideology and lobbying for better laws. The entire trial will be about whether or not he's guilty of breaking the laws that already exist.
The defense can object to letting him explain his libertarian viewpoints if they can convince the judge it is not relevant to the case or charges. Which the prosecutor in this case directly attempted during pretrial last month: > Prosecutors in the case against alleged Silk Road mastermind Ross Ulbricht want the court to prohibit Ulbricht from saying almost anything political at all, according to a motion filed last…
I'll never understand this - the ability to petition for the judge to disallow a valid defense, because they're scared it might work. That's the entire point of a defense.
To me, this goes against every freedom of speech. To not be allowed to defend yourself in any and every way possible is to not be free.
Edit: "in any and every truthful way possible" - obviously perjury is perjury.
Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#56It will be interesting to see this unfold. But I am inclined to believe Ulbricht here. My main reason for finding it immediately believable is that the name "Dread Pirate Roberts" is an obvious Princess Bride reference to a pirate who inherited his trade and occupation from another pirate. That combined with the fact that the name did not appear on the forums for the first few months leads me to believe that the name…
People were inclined to believe Hans Reiser too[1],[2], untill he led the police to Nina's body. Despite all the evidence, lots of people did not want to believe it was him and held out for hope, in the end, though, people realized indeed it was he who did it. [1] http://news.slashdot.org/story/08/06/09/1155214/hans-reiser-... [2] http://yro.slashdot.org/story/08/02/23/2218256/hans-reiser-a...
I totally wanted to believe in Hans, given his accomplishments to the file system community and open source, I was saddened when he admitted to doing it.
Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
>the libertarian ideals that justify the existence of Silk Road should have their day in court Real trials don't play out like they do in hollywood. You don't get to spend your time in court talking about your ideology and lobbying for better laws. The entire trial will be about whether or not he's guilty of breaking the laws that already exist.
You're missing my point: I don't want him to stand up in court and lecture on the nature of freedom and personal responsibility like something out of Inherit The Wind , I would just like to see him take the rap for what he (probably) did without this silly "it was the one armed man" defense. It's not about the trial, because the trial is lost no matter what he does (regardless of whether or not he's innocent, he's go…
Ahh OK. It appears I did misunderstand you. Well, if he actually did do the things that the government is claiming, I still wouldn't look at him like he's a champion for libertarian ideals. The person who took the actions of which he is accused is interested in only one thing: money.
Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
The defense can object to letting him explain his libertarian viewpoints if they can convince the judge it is not relevant to the case or charges. Which the prosecutor in this case directly attempted during pretrial last month: > Prosecutors in the case against alleged Silk Road mastermind Ross Ulbricht want the court to prohibit Ulbricht from saying almost anything political at all, according to a motion filed last…
I'll never understand this - the ability to petition for the judge to disallow a valid defense, because they're scared it might work. That's the entire point of a defense. To me, this goes against every freedom of speech. To not be allowed to defend yourself in any and every way possible is to not be free. Edit: "in any and every truthful way possible" - obviously perjury is perjury.
He shouldn't be allowed to express political views during the trial. It isn't a valid defense because his political views are completely unrelated to the matters at hand. The only purpose of the trial is to determine whether or not he did the things the government says he did. If he did them, then he broke existing laws.
Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
If he were being tried by a jury of his peers , it would not need explaining.
'peer group' != legal 'peers'. http://criminal.findlaw.com/criminal-procedure/what-is-a-jur...
And this is why I hope I never end up on trial for anything. Some types of people are more easy to dislike than others. For example, I have asperger's. I'm pretty certain that if I ever went on trial for anything, my personality would increase the chances that I get convicted.
Re: Silk Road Defense Says Ulbricht Was Framed by the ‘Real’ Dread Pirate Roberts
#60As for "murder for hire": he was never charged with it. Why?! Why on earth prosecutors have chosen not to throw a book on a guy? Because it never happened. Whole "murder for hire" story is just a part of smear campaign.
Well, the other possibility is that there isn't enough proof. But IMO if there isn't enough proof, he's not guilty, and they shouldn't even mention it, to avoid damaging his public perception.
The counterpoint to what you say is that the evidence comes from personal documents/conversations/etc. they obtained, and if they released some of that but not all -- in order to avoid publicly releasing any murder-for-hire bits -- you would be here saying that the selective release is suspicious and that they should release everything in order to avoid damaging his reputation through cherry-picking evidence.