Jury Rules Ross Ulbricht is Silk Road Mastermind; Guilty of All Charges

The jury in the Silk Road court case has ruled that Ross Ulbricht is guilty of all seven charges in a Manhattan court on Wednesday. The jury were convinced that Ulbricht was Dread Pirate Roberts, Silk Road’s shadowy mastermind, returning their verdict in just three-and-a-half hours.

The evidence against Ulbricht appeared overwhelming: when he was arrested in a San Francisco public library, Ulbricht was logged into the Silk Road admin account on his laptop. Law enforcement found thousands of pages of evidence spanning many years on the seized laptop linking Ulbricht to the Dread Pirate Roberts alter ego.

Though Ulbricht’s legal team admitted that Ulbricht had created Silk Road, they claimed that he had done so as an “economic experiment” and had handed the site over to others before it became the black market it was notorious for. “The real Dread Pirate Roberts is out there,” Joshua Dratel, Ulbricht’s lead attorney said.

The legal team is to appeal the decision, citing frequent grounds for a mistrial and questioning the decisions of the judge during the trial.

Amongst Ulbricht’s convictions is two charges – one for continuing criminal enterprise, the other for narcotics conspiracy – that could land him with a minimum jail sentence of 30 years, up to life imprisonment.

Sentencing could take place on 15^th May.

Source: Forbes