The accused creator of the Silk Road online drug bazaar, which enabled over $200 million in anonymous online sales, is to be sentenced on Friday. The director of a documentary about Ross Ulbricht told RT why his case «impacts the average citizen.»
Federal prosecutors are seeking a sentence «substantially above» the 20-year mandatory minimum that United States District Judge Katherine Forrest is looking to impose on Ulbricht, 31, who admitted to creating Silk Road, but denied any wrongdoing.
Ulbricht was indicted in 2014 on charges related to Silk Road – an underground website where visitors could buy and sell illegal drugs, and hacking services, all on the ‘deep web’ through highly-anonymized crypto currency bitcoin. The government said Ulbricht ran the site under the pseudonym of ‘Dread Pirate Roberts’ (reference to a character in the 1987 movie ‘The Princess Bride’), and it took a jury less than four hours to find the man guilty on all counts.
Ulbricht, who grew up in Austin, Texas, is expected to appeal his conviction.
According to prosecutors, the Silk Road operated for over two years and heavily relied on the so-called Tor network, which lets users communicate anonymously. The black-market website, which had generated over $214 million in sales, was shut down in 2013, when authorities seized the illicit service and arrested Ulbricht at a San Francisco website. Not that it was the only market.
Prosecutors keep insisting that Ulbricht went to extremes to protect his brainchild, Silk Road, soliciting the murders of several people who posed a threat to the business. No evidence the murders were actually carried out has ever been presented, however.
In February, a federal jury found Ulbricht guilty of seven felony charges in connection with running Silk Road, including drug trafficking, money laundering, computer hacking, and identity fraud. Murder for hire allegations are not on the list since the accusation was not charged in the New York case. Ulbricht will face another process for a murder-for-hire charge in a separate, Maryland court case.
In a letter to Judge Forrest, the prosecution wrote that “Ulbricht’s conviction is the first of its kind, and his sentencing is being closely watched.” To reflect the “seriousness of the offense, to promote respect for the law and to afford adequate deterrence to criminal conduct” the prosecution has urged Judge Forrest to go beyond the minimum 20 year sentence for Ulbricht.
“The court thus has an opportunity to send a clear message to anyone tempted to follow his example that the operation of these illegal enterprises comes with severe consequences.”