Hacker News Reader

Comment by rhabarba | Hacker News Reader

Providing online forums is legal now.

Given there are at least thousands if not millions of people who "provide online forums," and pretty much this single one is in prison, I have to wonder if there's something unique about this case?

I don't know anything about this guy. Is there really nothing unique about his case?

Silk Road was, at its height, uniquely successful and making an absolute mockery of the United States government's capacity to regulate drug trafficking. In addition, he fashioned himself an anti-establishment persona, going by the handle "Dread Pirate Roberts" online.

He was unique in his magnitude of success. Governments can successfully magnify their enforcement ability by making an example of outliers.

It was a forum that mocked the government's ability to regulate drug trafficking and therefore he was prosecuted?

I find that hard to believe.

> I find that had to believe.

Inconceivable!

There are multiple examples of federal law enforcement making examples of particularly brazen instances of flouting federal law that are disproportionate to the actual harm caused. Kevin Mitnick is a classic example.

Here's the thing about the US federal law enforcement: there aren't actually a lot of them. In a country of 380 million people, there are 38,000 agents. Google employs more people than the FBI. If the US citizenry decided to take collective action against them, the federal domestic police force alone could not stand against the citizenry.

This shapes where they apply their resources. To be most effective, they need to be visible so that people don't start to think of them as toothless, because mass-resistance to their general police activities would actually work. So they pursue cases into the dust to generate high-profile images of lawbreakers having a really awful time to discourage other lawbreakers.

He was prosecuted because he broke US drug law. But he was prosecuted to the extent he was prosecuted because Silk Road had made headlines as something untouchable by federal authority. That's the kind of Capone energy that the federal law enforcement cannot abide and survive as an institution.

Which is all different from “running a forum mocking drug enforcement capability” which makes it sound like he was a satirist.

Dread Pirate Roberts is legend, look up the silk road marketplace.

Theres probably a movie or two about it too

Oh so it was a marketplace, not a forum. Like one that allowed people to openly transact illegal goods? That makes more sense.

It's weird that GP seemed to purposely obscure that.

Yes, it was the biggest drug market on the dark web at that time, and the 50,676 bitcoins seized by the feds from then is today worth 5,3 billion dollars to give you an idea.

Also there was a long side story with disappeared bitcoins, presumably stolen by federal investigators.

American Kingpin by Nick Bilton is an excellent book covering Silk Road and what makes this unique

Hiring a hitman is legal now.

blatant entrapment and gaslighting for more than a year by law enforcement dedicating 24h to it.

the real criminals for that prank were never even tried.

Looks like the "real criminal" was charged.

https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/silk-road-drug-vendor-w...

wake me up when you get a cop working for you for over a year just to convince you that you have to hire his friend to kill your other employee

The seven offenses in question: distributing narcotics, distributing narcotics by means of the Internet, conspiring to distribute narcotics, engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise, conspiring to commit computer hacking, conspiring to traffic in false identity documents, and conspiring to commit money laundering

A judge bypassed the jury and prosecutor and sentenced him as if he hired hit men and admitted doing so. The sentence upgrade was based on a preponderance of evidence, whereas they would have had to proven beyond a reasonable doubt had he been charged.

Framing this as judicial activism is false. Many sentencing arrangements include - with the agreement of the defendant (since it is their rights in this case) - to have other related activities factored in exactly this manner.

It happens all the time in pleas and diversion agreements, so don’t frame it as a reckless lone judge going off the reservation.

He was never tried for that. Don't believe the disinformation.

To be fair - he was not pardoned for that, he could still be charged for it. He was only pardoned for crimes related to drugs.

do you know that is actually the case ? i've been trying to find the text of the pardon and haven't been able to yet. can only find Trump's description of it as "full and unconditional"

edit: i see your other comment with the context

They unfortunately have not released the text yet.

It should eventually pop up here: https://www.justice.gov/pardon/clemency-recipients

(among other places)

It is now there, see - https://www.justice.gov/pardon/media/1386096/dl

He was not pardoned for any crimes not charged, and therefore could still be charged.

Does this mean California could go after Ulbricht for solicitation on the murder scheme, like, tomorrow?

Running an elicit drug and whatever else you want to sell market is legal now.

This was a pandering to get Libertarians' votes. It has nothing to do with the crime itself. I wouldn't commit any crimes and expect to get away with them unless I anticipated becoming the pawn in someone's scheme to get elected.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com