He created the Silk Road, a popular online exchange for illegal drugs, and prosecutors alleged that he paid $730K to try to kill six people. (He was not, however, charged with attempted murder. Instead, he was charged and convicted of money laundering and drug offenses.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Ulbricht
EDIT: I just want to make completely clear that I didn't post this info in an effort to discredit his essay's argument, which is that the U.S. prison system is in need of drastic reform. I agree wholeheartedly with that. I just wanted to give some context, because I didn't know who he was, and the "Who is Ross?" section of the freeross.org site makes it seem like he's an angelic Boy Scout philanthropist sweetheart.
It's well known now there were multiple people behind the DPR accounts AND 2 corrupt agents (now in prison) had admin access too.
Never proven, never prosecuted and dismissed "with prejudice" by the govt, meaning they can never be used against him again.
Ross was NOT accused of selling drugs or laundering money, or hacking computers. Charges based on what others listed on SR (i.e, laundering money conspiracy charge = because some users were cashing out their btc for other currencies. Hacking conspiracy = because some users listed hacking tutorials or software.)
Wikiepedia shouldn't be used as a reliable source when it comes to legal cases.
Weird to see the same podcast that hosts freeross information as also hosting bitcoin podcasts.
Adrian Crenshaw the security researcher has a good defcon talk on how ross went down for SR. Don't post your tech problems for an illegal service on stackoverflow!
https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-2nd-circuit/186
"The district court found by a preponderance of the evidence that Ulbricht commissioned at least five murders in the course of protecting Silk Road's anonymity, a finding that Ulbricht does not challenge in this appeal. Ulbricht discussed those anticipated murders callously and casually in his journal and in his communications with the purported assassin Redandwhite."
"Ulbricht does not mention his orders for the commission of those murders until his reply brief. Even there, he does not argue that the district court erred in concluding that he deliberately commissioned those murders; rather, he claims instead only that the murders did not support a life sentence because they did not actually take place."
"But in evaluating Ulbricht's character and dangerousness, the most relevant points are that he wanted the murders to be committed, he paid for them, and he believed that they had been carried out. The fact that his hired assassin may have defrauded him does not reflect positively on Ulbricht's character. Commissioning the murders significantly justified the life sentence."
>No one deserves this, even if they have to here for the sake of others’ safety. Certainly, the many non-violent drug offenders growing old in here don’t. Pain does not heal pain. A lost soul is not redeemed in a cage.
I agree with this part of Ulbricht's letter here. If not for those murders (which he believed were successfully carried out), he would be a non-violent drug offender, and not deserving of anywhere near a life sentence. But working your way up into a grandiose Walter White-style megalomaniac paying people to kill your foes? That's imperialistic tyrant behavior, not freedom fighter behavior.
He was very likely the only DPR (or at least the only significant one), and, in all likelihood, the chat logs are authentic. No, they weren't proven in court, due to the corrupt agents you mentioned (the defense would cast aspersions just as you did here), but if you look at the facts, they're very likely to be real. Also, the judge explicitly permitted the murder-for-hire evidence to be shown in court, which contributed to the judge's sentencing deccision.
Just to cover one of the six murders: Mark Force didn't have admin access when Ulbricht courted him to murder Curtis Green; Force was just a regular SR user at that point. (He did previously have illicit admin access via Green's account, but this account was disabled by an admin a while before the murder-for-hire conversations occurred.)
That entire encounter and conversation was documented in real-time by law enforcement who had access to Force's account, so Force couldn't have just doctored them. Yes, there are some other circumstances here, like Force (unknowingly to law enforcement at the moment) using Green's account to steal Bitcoins before all of this, which is what caused Ulbricht to later order Green's murder, but he definitely wasn't entrapped or tricked into murdering him. Ulbricht was the one who suggested the murder and requested it, and he paid him $80,000 upon seeing staged photos of what appeared to be Green's bloody corpse. These Bitcoin transactions are obviously all public.
Read the chat logs ordering Green's and FriendlyChemist's (and later FriendlyChemist's associates) murders and tell me what you think:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/gqepaijrm8lsqsm/260502700-Ulbricht... - Pages 31 - 51
https://www.wired.com/2015/02/read-transcript-silk-roads-bos...
You can see Ulbricht deliberating the decision with his "advisor", Variety Jones / Cimon, before finally concluding he had to die.
No, I didn't give a rock-solid defense of why I think they're authentic, but I don't have the time at the moment. If this thread is still active, I may give a more lengthy analysis later as to why I think they're legitimate.
I believe he's basically a modern mini-Pablo Escobar. I do think drugs should be legalized - specifically to prevent megalomaniacs like Ulbricht from gaining immense, malignant power and ambition. I hope to see the day when all drugs are legal for recreational use while he remains rotting in prison, aged 85.
But practically, it always seemed to me fairly obvious that he did author those messages. Do you not think that’s the case?
It is true that he was convicted of money laundering and drug offenses. However, during his sentencing hearing, the murder-for-hire which was never discussed or proved in court, was brought in as part of how long to lock him away.
That alone should vacate and admonish the judge for letting that scam take place.
I'm a big believer in criminal justice reform, but this is one of those instances where what he was doing was so dangerous that someone had to be made an example of at the highest level. To be honest, his arrest and conviction likely saved his life: sooner or later the cartels would have found him, tortured him to gain control of the site, then dissolved his body in acid.
I also think the Silk Road story would be a fascinating 2-season, 20 episode series on Netflix. Read the story linked below for a great 2 hour read.
This case generated sensationalism and media like Wired and ArsTechnica ran with it, at the expense of a young man awaiting trial. They destroyed his public image and relayed false and inaccurate information. It's sad to see people still sharing those superficial and sensationalized articles years after.
You should check this. Based on 400+ references, incl. investigation reports and more never-before-seen docs. The real story is SO much more interesting & mind-blowing than Ross being that one guy running the site the whole time.
However, I agree his punishment is excessive; a 20-40 years sentence with possibility of parole would seem appropriate.
Yes. Amazon is fucking up the functioning of the overall market, by undercutting legal products with fraudulent fake products, while shielding the criminals from retribution. It's been extremely harmful and Bezos should be punished for it.
People will say they choose all sorts of theoretical punishments that have no chance of happening. In reality, I doubt very many people would actually go through with it if actually given the chance.
Sentence criminals to a certain amount of pain, and let them choose whether to experience it via decades of low-grade boredom, or hours/minutes/seconds of intense agony.
Personally, in an ideal world that is not this one, I think that prison serves the dual purpose of rehabilitation and removal-from-society, and that the "voluntary torture" approach serves neither end. But in our actual world, prison is only sometimes barely-rehabilitative, and I'm not sure how valuable removal from society is on its own. So... interesting discussion, at least.
An example is for example the Enron case. The executives needed to be punished, but I doubt they were an ongoing threat to society after they had been exposed.
Ross Ulbricht is another example. I doubt that he is an ongoing threat to society but still needs some punishment for breaking the law.
Bernie Madoff is another example. I doubt that he is an ongoing threat to society, but he is in prison as punishment and to serve as a deterrent to others.
In cases like these, the "voluntary corporal punishment" might be an option.
Every stitch of evidence says he did. Defenders will make two claims: 1. he was never charged – despite the fact the schemes were absolutely a part of the conspiracy charges he was convicted of or 2. the evidence was planted!
The first fact being provably untrue and the second being impossible to disprove.
Prison is a dark, and horrendous existence. I wouldn't wish it on anyone. I would spend a lifetime avoiding it. I believe in rehabilitation and remorse. I don't believe in "throwing away" people who make mistakes.
But once you've decided that the death of one person is worth less than the "value" of your business, a business specifically designed to thwart obvious laws for your own profit, I have a hard time finding sympathy for you, beyond the basic sympathy I'd extend anyone who is being forced to live with the consequences of their actions.
FWIW I have a hard time having sympathy for a drug kingpin hacker doing hard time. Mess with the best, die like the rest.
Like people who contract the murders of other other people, in order to keep their criminal empire, with zero remorse or appreciation what they have done? Exactly.
They wanted to make an example out of him, and to add insult to injury, they took him out on a bullshit charge so he couldn't become a martyr for his well-meaning ideals of ending prohibition.
[1] https://news.bitcoin.com/rogue-silk-road-agent-admits-to-ste...
Yeah, throw away the keys. Why not send him to Guantanamo while we're at it? There are plenty of innocent people there to keep him company.
