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Ross Ulbricht's Lawyer Requests Suppression Of Silk Road Evidence
Despite a failed attempt to have charges dismissed, the alleged Silk Road operator Ross Ulbricht's lawyer has filed a new motion to have evidence dismissed, citing recent court rulings in an argument that the Silk Road related searches were overly broad. From the article:
Dratel [Ulbricht's lawyer] argues in his 102-page motion filed last Friday that "the government conducted a series of 14 searches and seizures of various physical devices containing electronically stored information ('ESI'), and of ESI itself from Internet providers and other sources. Some of the ESI was obtained via search warrant, but other ESI was obtained via court order, and still other ESI was obtained without benefit of any warrant at all." ...
The defense lawyer argues that even the searches for which the government had a warrant were overbroad and based on evidence that may have been obtained illegally. The attorney writes: " As set forth ante, all of the searches and seizures conducted pursuant to warrants and/or orders were based on the initial ability of the government to locate the Silk Road Servers, obtain the ESI on them, and perform extensive forensic analysis of that ESI. Thus, all subsequent searches and seizures are invalid if that initial locating the Silk Road Servers, obtaining their ESI, and gaining real-time continued access to those servers, was accomplished unlawfully."
The defense lawyer argues that even the searches for which the government had a warrant were overbroad and based on evidence that may have been obtained illegally. The attorney writes: " As set forth ante, all of the searches and seizures conducted pursuant to warrants and/or orders were based on the initial ability of the government to locate the Silk Road Servers, obtain the ESI on them, and perform extensive forensic analysis of that ESI. Thus, all subsequent searches and seizures are invalid if that initial locating the Silk Road Servers, obtaining their ESI, and gaining real-time continued access to those servers, was accomplished unlawfully."
Compared to the other arguments his lawyer has used, this one might actually have promise. I would not be surprised if this one took longer to try because they were actually taking it seriously. Even with lots of legwork, if the final evidence was collected illegally it could very well be inadmissible, and standards when it comes to this type of evidence are still in flux with investigators not having clear rules to go by yet.
CCE has nothing to do with being in prison. The requirements for conviction under Continuing Criminal Enterprise are that the defendant:
Managed or supervised
a series of
felony
drug offenses
involving at least four other people.
That actually sounds a LOT like "running a drug market", which about right.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki...