U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday granted a “full and unconditional pardon” to Ross Ulbricht, the creator of the notorious Silk Highway drug market, after spending 11 years behind bars.
“I simply referred to as the mom of Ross William Ulbricht to let her know that in honor of her and the Libertarian Motion, which supported me so strongly, it was my pleasure to have simply signed a full and unconditional pardon of her son, Ross,” Trump mentioned in a put up shared on Reality Social.
“The scum that labored to convict him have been a number of the similar lunatics who have been concerned within the modern-day weaponization of presidency towards me. He was given two life sentences, plus 40 years. Ridiculous!”
Launched in February 2011, Silk Highway emerged as a serious hub on the darkish internet for unlawful medication and different illicit items and providers. {The marketplace} generated over $200 million in income in its practically three years of existence, per authorities.
It was taken down in October 2013 coinciding with the arrest of Ulbricht, who then glided by the net moniker Dread Pirate Roberts. In 2015, he was sentenced to life in jail with out parole after being discovered responsible of cash laundering, narcotics trafficking, and pc hacking fees.
A bit of over two years in the past, the U.S. Division of Justice (DoJ) revealed it confiscated 50,676 Bitcoin in November 2021 that was stolen within the 2012 hack of the now-defunct Silk Highway darkish internet market, making it one of many largest cryptocurrency seizures so far.
James Ellingson (aka redandwhite), a Silk Highway drug vendor who claimed to have organized for the homicide of 5 folks for Ulbricht, has since been charged with narcotics trafficking and cash laundering offenses. Nevertheless, the DoJ mentioned there is no such thing as a proof these murders truly happened.
In a letter to the choose searching for leniency previous to his sentencing, Ulbricht mentioned he wasn’t searching for monetary achieve when he began Silk Highway and that it was imagined to be “about giving folks the liberty to make their very own decisions, to pursue their very own happiness, nonetheless they individually noticed match.”
“I believed on the time that folks ought to have the suitable to purchase and promote no matter they wished as long as they weren’t hurting anybody else,” he added. “Silk Highway turned out to be a really naive and dear concept that I deeply remorse.”