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Ok... if we're going to take a detour to discuss Ross Ulbricht...
1. By setting up and running the Silk Road, he created a new technology-based drug networking service, empowering its larger dealers to massively increase their business to the degree to which they could be perceived as functioning on par with cartels.
2. The evidence suggesting that he had attempted to contract the murders of at least five people was presented in court. It was removed from the indictment, but still factored into the sentence. From the court transcript:
"The first factual finding relates to the direct abuse of violence. Under 2D1.1 (b) (2) there would be a two-level upward offense level adjustment for the directed use of violence. Because it is contested, the Court must make appropriate factual findings if it is to include it. The standard by which I do that is by a preponderance of the evidence. Ulbricht's directed violence here is and relates to the murders for hire which he is alleged to have commissioned and paid for. The Court must determine whether these allegations have been demonstrated by a preponderance of the evidence and I find that there is ample and unambiguous evidence that Ulbricht commissioned five murders as part of his efforts to protect his criminal enterprise, and that he paid for those murders. There is no evidence that he was role-playing.
The Court finds that the evidence is clear and unambiguous and it far exceeds the necessary preponderance findings, that Ulbricht believed he was paying for murders of those he wanted eliminated, and that he believed they had in fact been murdered. He was told his first victim had a wife and several children. That fact was known to Ulbricht and it is never mentioned by him in connection with his consideration of the murder...
He commissioned the hits, there is no discussion of hypotheticals, he paid actual funds. He paid hundreds of thousands of dollars, which were, in fact, paid...
That there had been no confirmation of any of the deaths does not eliminate the fact that he directed violence and directed the use of violence."
3. One of those contracts was spoofed entrapment from law enforcement. If you don't know enough about your hired hitman to know that he's an undercover agent, then you don't know enough about them to know what they're going to do with your commands... whether they'll take the money and run or whether the targeted individual will just wind up dead. Either way, it's pretty damning evidence that he was contracting hits.
4. Ulbricht was sent faked "proof of death" photos.
5. Do you honestly believe he is innocent of that point, or is your consideration on this case concerned solely in the extremity of the sentence? Is there something you like about this guy that fuels your anger over his sentence? Is there something to this story related to bit coins and Tor-type browsers that plays a role in your interest? Is it related to the fact that the FBI's stated methods of locating the Icelandic servers don't make sense, and are probably not true?
6. Preet Bharara was the prosecutor, not the judge who handed out the sentence, Katherine Forrest.
7. A seemingly large factor in her decision related to future deterrence, which is a concept I generally think is unreasonable... but if you're looking for why the sentence was so extreme, that would probably be your answer. Regardless, if you added up the minimum sentences for count 2 and 4 (since the judge struck counts 1 and 3 for being redundant lesser charges) you're already talking minimum 30 years. If you add that to the maximum sentences for the remaining three charges, you get potentially another 40 years added to that. Ross was thirty or so when he was arrested? A 70 year long sentence doesn't sound like much of an improvement over a life sentence at that point.
If you'd like to read the transcript of the decision, it's here on the bottom of the page
Originally Posted by Jinsai
