Comment by trcollinson | Hacker News Reader

Comment by trcollinson | Hacker News Reader

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Absolutely it is, on a few grounds. First off just looking at the various conspiracy charges (Money Laundering conspiracy, computer hacking conspiracy, drug trafficking conspiracy, and criminal empire conspiracy) can lead to numerous decades each in jail time. Functionally speaking this would lead to a life sentence but it could be something like 200 years in prison without possibility of parol.

On the count of conspiracy to commit murder, 6 times over, if those are ever brought to trial, can come with an actual life sentence, or life sentences. It is very likely he could face numerous sentences of life in prison plus a number of years of prison on top of that. All of this depends on the judge and how s/he would like to handling the sentencing portion of this trial, which probably will not happen for weeks or months.

As there was no plea agreement accepted by the defendant, it is quite likely that the prosecution has always believes that he would be found guilty and pay a very high price for his crimes. Because of this they either a) never gave him a plea deal to consider or b) gave a very costly plea deal which wouldn't have been much better than just going through the trial and going to jail for life.

I thought, generally, if someone was convicted of numerous charges, time spent would count concurrently for _all_ charges. So all the conspiracy charges would lead to a multi-decade long sentence rather than 200+ years. Could you shed some light on why that's not how it works for this particular case?

It depends on the various statutes (which I'm just not sure of in this case), but judges at their discretion can usually sentence concurrently or consecutively. It wouldn't be unheard of for some of his charges to be concurrent and others to be consecutive, but that'll depend on the statute, the judge and potentially, the other jurisdictions where he continues to await trial (i.e., if he's convicted in his next trial, assuming that still takes place, that sentencing could happen consecutively or concurrently, depending on any number of variables).

The most I can say is, it depends. Federal sentencing guidelines are interesting for a few reasons.

First, there is a formula which, quite literally, is a mathematical formula telling the judge a federal minimum and a federal maximum range of times for a crime. This is based on a number of data points surrounding the laws broken.

Second, each law has rules about its own sentencing guidelines baked in. Let's look at the specifics for Conspiracy for a Criminal Enterprise: 20 year minimum for first conviction, 30 year minimum for second conviction, a life sentence for a "extremely large enterprise". There are tables and figures for figuring out what all of this means for minimum to maximum and so on. I am not going to attempt to say I understand how this particular Federal judge will try to figure it out.

Third, in general sentences of multiple convictions on the same trial are supposed to be run concurrently. However, this can be changed if a court decides otherwise, for various reasons. Additionally it can be changed if a specific law states that it should not be run concurrently, but instead consecutively. The judge must actively consider whether to impose a concurrent or a consecutive sentence accounting to the US Code (18 US Code 3553 (a) [1]). Again I do not want to speak for a Federal judge but, I could easily see a judge interpreting these rules in this case to justify a consecutive instead of concurrent sentence.

I agree with you 100% that Mr. Ulbricht will likely not see the maximum consecutive sentence in this case. However, there are no hard and fast rules in Federal sentencing, they are guidelines. It could be decades, it could be quite a bit more.

[1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/3553#a

Thanks for the detailed response. I appreciate it.

I thought a conviction was sentenced based on the most severe available for a set of charges, not all charges cumulatively. There were a lot of articles recently about how the media often used some common misunderstanding to say someone faced "centuries" behind bars for something that probably would've maxed out around 20 years.

Running a "Continuing Criminal Enterprise" (one of the charges he was just convicted of) comes with a 20-year mandatory minimum sentence.

http://www.ussc.gov/guidelines-manual/2014/2014-chapter-2-d#...

Depending on how everything else stacks up, he could certainly see 25+ years, but most of the sentences will run concurrently.

Consecutive is the default if the judge doesn't specify. Some laws require consecutive. Other than that it is up to the judge to specify.

http://criminal.lawyers.com/criminal-law-basics/how-do-multi...

>If a judge wants to order the sentences to run consecutively or concurrently, she must state so specifically in the sentencing order, which is the court document that sets a defendant's sentences. If she doesn't do so, the sentences will run consecutively automatically.

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