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Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

nytimes.com

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Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#181

Post by bkeroack »

BoardsOfCanada wrote: post #151
dragonwriter wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So a murder is hidden under a less serious offence? No. Soliciting a killing for pay ("murder for hire" in informal terms) as an act to advance a conspiracy is included (hardly "hidden") as one of the alleged overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy, at least one of which must have been found by a juror to have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt to vote to convict on the conspiracy charge.

Oh I see. unfortunately there is no "killing for pay" in the document you linked either. Just stop making shit up.

It's right there on page 3 ("II. Background A. The Murder-For-Hire Evidence") and continues for quite some length. I'm not a lawyer and haven't been following the case, but if he was convicted of what the government alleges in this section it pretty much eliminates the "non-violent" argument.

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#182

Post by rhino369 »

jjcm wrote: post #24

It's interesting. On one hand, if a leader of a traditional drug distribution network landed a life in prison sentence, I wouldn't have thought twice about it. With Silkroad though, I'm actually convinced by the defendants argument: that it provided safer, more trustworthy drugs to users. I've had friends who've died from purchasing bad drugs at raves from people who were looking to make money and run. In one situati…

How do Darknet networks solve contamination and false labeling issues? You are buying from an anonymous seller.

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#183

Post by abvdasker »

jjcm wrote: post #24

It's interesting. On one hand, if a leader of a traditional drug distribution network landed a life in prison sentence, I wouldn't have thought twice about it. With Silkroad though, I'm actually convinced by the defendants argument: that it provided safer, more trustworthy drugs to users. I've had friends who've died from purchasing bad drugs at raves from people who were looking to make money and run. In one situati…

Maybe I've watched Scarface one too many times, but I think the reason leaders of traditional drug distribution networks get life sentences is because they frequently resort to brutally violent means of running and defending their drug operations. Because they hold the supply of drugs rather than simply being a two-sided marketplace like the Silk Road, they have to physically defend that supply and the locations which house it (from rival organizations, the Police, etc). In a way, not only were the drugs being sold on the Silk Road safer, but the process of selling drugs was probably safer.

EDIT: This argument would probably hold up a lot better if Ulbricht hadn't tried to have people killed. sigh

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#184

Post by AndrewUnmuted »

zf00002 wrote: post #154
codecamper wrote: post #68

I'd say it's an unfair sentence, given that with bitcoin & a decentralized approach, it is unlikely that future versions of this sort of thing will be stoppable by any centralized government. They stopped & sued Napster. Did it stop file sharing? I think the government misplayed their cards -- again. Better to have partnered with Ulbricht -- and had a part in creating whatever future version of the market would be. B…

>it is unlikely that future versions of this sort of thing will be stoppable by any centralized government Silk road 2 has already been busted.

What about Abraxas, BlackBank, Agora, KISS, Outlaw, East India Company, Babylon, Oxygen, The Real Deal, Bloomsfield, and The Crypto Market?

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#185

Post by dragonwriter »

murbard2 wrote: post #116
dragonwriter wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Gross miscarriage of justice. People have a right to buy drugs. Legally, they do not. If you have a problem with that, take it up with (relevant to the federal laws at issue here) the Congress.

That's very unlikely to work, now what?

> That's very unlikely to work, now what?

Try harder, like by working to convince the public that such a right should exist, so that other people join you in your effort to convince Congress to change the law.

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#186

Post by Alupis »

deweller wrote: post #152
Cantremeber wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus, it happened multiple times. Even if no one was actually killed the guy still tried to have multiple people killed.

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.

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.

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#187

Post by BoardsOfCanada »

BoardsOfCanada wrote: post #82
tptacek wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is simply not true. Not only was the evidence introduced at trial, but it was tied to a specific charge, and considered at length by the court. https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1391...

So which of the charges is it (from your link): " charging Ulbricht with seven crimes: Narcotics Trafficking (Count One), Distribution of Narcotics by Means of the Internet (Count Two), Narcotics Trafficking Conspiracy (Count Three), Continuing Criminal Enterprise (Count Four), Conspiracy to Commit and Aid and Abet Computer Hacking (Count Five), Conspiracy to Traffic in Fraudulent Identification Documents (Count Six)…

From ArsTechinca: "Prosecutors' allegations that Ulbricht tried to arrange several murders-for-hire also came up at trial, but he was not charged for them in this case. Instead, one of those six accusations is pending in Maryland."

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#188

Post by cm2187 »

mckoss wrote: post #140
BoardsOfCanada wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was no such thing introduced for the trial. It was in the original press release, then it was withdrawn. Maybe it was because of Mark Force's transgressions, or maybe it was just for effect. Regardless, he never got the chance to defend himself against those particular allegations.

Agreed. From the FBI press release on his conviction[1] no mention of the murder-for-hire charge. This conviction and sentencing all stem from the drug-selling business enterprise. Our war-on-drugs sentencing is quite disproportional, IMHO; imputing societal harms that are unfounded. After all, Mr. Ulbright simply provided a safer way for consenting individuals to enter personal financial transactions. Silk Road is a…

You seem to suggest that silkroad was an innocent market place that was used for drug trafficking without the knowledge of its creator...

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#189

Post by BoardsOfCanada »

wutbrodo wrote: post #172
BoardsOfCanada wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So a murder is hidden under a less serious offence? Just search for the phrase murder in the document you linked. How many hits? Zero

Dude, it's right at the very beginning of the exact page that he linked you. The fact that it says "murder-for-hire" with hyphens doesn't somehow make it not say "murder". EDIT: Whoops I see that zorpner said basically the exact same thing just a couple minutes before me.

Yes, but was he sentenced for it?

Re: Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life in Prison

#190

Post by rhino369 »

placeybordeaux wrote: post #102

It looks like the lessons here are 1) Be careful how your promote your criminal enterprise (early bitcoin talk pages about silk road are from Ross) 2) Don't commit a crime to cover up a lesser crime (Covering up running silk road by trying to commit murder by hire) 3) regularaly check the IP of your service that is running a TOR site. Requests sent to that IP should have been blocked.

The real lesson should be don't serious commit crimes. I don't know any organization that has never had a security fuck up.
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