Silk Road creator Ross Ulbricht’s complicated attempts to ensure that he did not have to spend the rest of his life in jail ultimately failed as an appeals court ruled against him on Wednesday. He will now have to serve a life sentence in federal prison.
Ulbricht is known for creating and running Silk road, a dark web exchange that had nothing to do with clothes. Instead it provided people with an online modicum of procuring drugs. Ulbricht was apprehended and sentenced by a court to a life sentence two years ago after it discovered that it was he who operated and controlled silk road under the pseudonym “Dread Pirate Roberts.”
During the appeals, his lawyers argued that since the IP addresses that proved that he was the culprit were obtained without a warrant, they violated the fourth amendment rights. In case you are unaware of it:
The Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. It requires governmental searches and seizures to be conducted only upon issuance of a warrant, judicially sanctioned by probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized.
It was a pretty transparent attempt and unsurprisingly, failed. The sentence awarded to the Silk road founder is harsh, however, it is mostly due to the massive scale at which his exchange operated. He has also been slapped with kingpin charges, which as the name implies, is a charge slapped on people who are known to be in direct control of large drug trafficking — such as drug lords or leaders of cartels.
