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Comment by larssorenson | Hacker News Reader

Personally I find the judge's ruling utter rubbish. It is irrelevant if the server was Ulbricht's or not. If the FBI is trying to use evidence found within the server against him, then they should have to prove that they obtained it legally, whether or not it belongs to another individual or Ulbricht. And continuing on your point about best interests, this would amount to rolling up to random cars parked in a parking lot and having a drug sniffing dog walk around until they find something, then trying to arrest everyone parked around the car.

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> “He has failed to take the one step he needed to take to allow the Court to consider his substantive claims regarding the investigation: he has failed to submit anything establishing that he has a personal privacy interest in the Icelandic server or any of the other items imaged and/or searched and/or seized.”

This is the critical point as the judge notes. The FBI isn't proving that he owns it yet, just submitting it as evidence. The judge can't rule based on the fact that the FBI will eventually prove that Ulbrircht. At this point it's just a server that the FBI found something on they're planning on using in the trial. Combine that with the fact that the fourth only protects your own property from search and there's nothing the judge could really do.

There's some additional oddness around if the sworn affidavit would could be used to prove he owned the server later in the trial. It sounds like he could plead the 5th and the affidavit wouldn't hurt him but I'm not sure.

> “Defendant could have established such a personal privacy interest by submitting a sworn statement that could not be offered against him at trial as evidence of his guilt (though it could be used to impeach him should he take the witness stand),”

It's very similar to the reason judges have had to reject legal challenges to the NSA spying apparatus, the defendants couldn't show that they had standing, i.e. they were affected by the law.

In short his lawyers screwed up by failing to prove he had any standing to challenge the server as evidence in the first place. Providing this proof would give an unknown amount of damage to the prosecution but the contents of the server would not have been admissible at least.

So in short his lawyers fucked up

>The judge can't rule based on the fact that the FBI will eventually prove that Ulbrircht. //

But don't they need to do this at some point in order to get a conviction - if this server is that used to run Silk Road and they want to prove that he ran the Silk Road then it seems like a necessary step. At the point of them making this claim surely the judge has to say "if this evidence proves the defendant owned the server then you've infringed his rights under the Fourth Amendment and the evidence must be discounted"?

Yes, but at this point there's no proof that the server belongs to him so the judge can't throw it out because he has no standing to challenge it's admissibility in the trial. I don't think that this precludes it from being thrown out on appeal or later in the trial but the motion to dismiss before the judge couldn't go through. What the judge ruled right now is just about the pretrial motions to dismiss. I'm not well versed enough in the legal system to say if this is prejudicial against it later being found to have violated his 4th amendment rights, judges can strike evidence from the record at later points though.

Or no. If they can prove that was the silk road server, illegal activities were being facilitated by it, and DPR was accessing and managing it then I don't see them needing to prove he owned it(which it seems he didn't because it was leased).

"At this point it's just a server that the FBI found something on they're planning on using in the trial."

Yes, a server they potentially broke into and violated someone's privacy over. Why does it have to be more complicated than that?

In fact, someone at the FBI should be charged with some sort of illegal-seizure crime, or violation of privacy crime. Whatever it's called these days by the lawyer-priesthood.

> And continuing on your point about best interests, this would amount to rolling up to random cars parked in a parking lot and having a drug sniffing dog walk around until they find something, then trying to arrest everyone parked around the car.

But that pretty much exactly that FBI and other agencies are doing right now in the Internet. And this ruling puts a legal precedent footing under such behavior.

This ruling doesn't establish a precedent. If it's appealed and upheld, that would establish a precedent.

In the US, trial courts find rulings of fact, and appellate courts find rulings of law. Only the latter create precedents.

Half right. Trial court judges make rulings of law, juried make findings of fact. An appellate court can then correct the trial court's legal errors, if necessary. But you're right that trial courts' legal rulings aren't precedential.

Yeah, "finding of fact" is a more apt phrasing than "ruling of fact". I thought of that after posting my comment, but felt it was a probably bit fine a distinction for the point I was making. Thanks for the clarification.

Pretty sure they would do this.

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