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Murder Accusations Hang Over Silk Road Boss Ulbricht's Sentencing
Patrick O'Neill writes: Ross Ulbricht has never been tried for murder. But tomorrow, when the convicted Silk Road creator is sentenced to prison, murder will be on the mind of the judge. Despite never filing murder-for-hire charges, New York federal prosecutors have repeatedly pushed for harsh sentencing because they say Ulbricht solicited multiple murders. The judge herself recently referred to Ulbricht's "commission of murders-for-hire" in a letter about the sentencing, painting an even grimmer picture of Ulbricht's sentencing prospects.
He could be a scumbag working at source forge. Why hasn't slashdot posted a story about that yet? It's only in the firehose, what, 6 times?
I think you are correct, though I am not American either.
"United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220 (2005), is a United States Supreme Court decision concerning criminal sentencing. The Court ruled that the Sixth Amendment right to jury trial requires that, other than a prior conviction, only facts admitted by a defendant or proved beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury may be used to calculate a sentence, whether the defendant has pleaded guilty or been convicted at trial. The maximum sentence a judge may impose is a sentence based upon the facts admitted by the defendant or proved to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt."
Wikipedia, but probably ok for this.
This reminds me of the last time I had jury duty. The prosecutor spent a huge amount of time explaining how if we were selected for the jury and were to find the defendant guilty, then at sentencing time there would be a free-for-all where they'd present information about other past alleged crimes that weren't part of this case (and I think for which the defendant had previously been tried unsuccessfully, my memory is foggy), and we'd be expected to set the punishment in the context of the full list of alleged crimes, not just the current crime for which we were convicting him. He waved his hands endlessly insisting that this was not double jeopardy, and the judge even made a statement that this was so.
To me that situation would be "trying" the defendant for the same crime twice in every practical sense of the word, just merely not "trying" him in the technical sense. Anybody have more experience/insight on this? Is this legit or is it an end-run around constitutional protections that everybody in the legal system has just collectively agreed on?
No. US v. Booker is about "enhanced sentencing," that is, a judge giving a defendant a sentence greater than set by statute. Normally, a prosecutor can use almost anything to push for the maximum sentence. Simply put, if crime X has a statutory sentence of 3-5 years a prosecutor can bring in uncharged crimes to get 5 years. US v. Booker is about going above the 5 years (in my example). In Booker, Federal guidelines only allowed a 21 year sentence but the judge gave 30 years due to additional evidence given during sentencing. The SCOTUS ruled that enhanced sentencing can only be based upon facts proven beyond a reasonable doubt to the jury and sent it back down. Booker got 30 years again but ended with 27 years due to sentencing law changes. Additionally, the SCOTUS said that the sentencing guidelines themselves were advisory and not mandatory.
In the case of Ulbricht, the evidence that he might have had someone killed or hired someone (or whatever it is) can come in to say that he should get the max sentence for what he was convicted because he's a bad guy. He won't be convicted or sentenced for murder.
He will be sentenced for what has been tried and found guilty for, but in the same way his defence lawyer i suppose is trying ask for some mercy by presenting to the judge some evidence of the good personality of the convict, the prosecutor is doing the opposite, asking from the judge to have no (or little) mercy - i am not a lawyer, but i think this is the usual way (at least in Greece/Europe) when a convict is sentenced: the judge has the responsibility to decide for a sentence that is somewhere between the minimum and maximum the law states, based on convict's personality criteria
Antisthenes: "Wisdom begins by examining the words/names." - excuse my English, i am (slightly...) better with my Greek!
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Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Did Ulbricht Pay a Hitman to Kill A Silkroad Employee?
A 'murder for hire' indictment was brought against Ulbricht but the prosecution declined to bring charges.
Indictments that aren't brought as charges infer nothing more than prosecutorial strategy, and it doesn't indicate the existence or not of a criminal action. Prosecutors typically have many more indictments than charges, and as the case proceeds they trade off indictments for the good of their case (e.g. plea bargains, shedding weaker parts, or simply the prosecutor merging indictments to bolster charges, as seems to be the case here).
The government say,
1. Dread Pirate Roberts (DPR) was the operator of Silkroad, an illegal drug-related website. ... but what's done is done,I just can't believe he was so stupid. I just wish more people had some integrity",
2. DPR was Ulbricht which now no one disputes (even Ulbricht now admits it, now that he's lost the case),
3. The Silkroad DPR account wanted the murder of a Silkroad employee for $80k which no one disputes,
4. A DEA agent posed as a hitman
4. Someone paid $40k to the hitman before it was done,
5. A DEA agent posed as a hitman and received $40k.
6. The DEA Agent sent the DPR account doctored photos of a dead body. DPR was told the person was tortured to death, and responded "I'm pissed I had to kill him
7. Another $40k was paid immediately afterwards,
8. No one was actually murdered.
9. Ulbrichts recovered laptop had his journal with an April 6 entry that says "gave [Hells Angels] go ahead to find tony76," and "sent payment to angels for hit on tony76 and his 3 associates.", and finally
10. When Ulbricht was caught in the library his computer was logged into the adminstration page of Silkroad under the DPR account.
(source: 1, 2)
Then at trial the `murder for hire` wasn't brought as a charge, but it was allowed to be used to describe the character of Ulbricht.
Character witnesses, and character evidence is allowed in trials.
As Judge Forrest said "the prejudicial effect is reduced by the Government’s stipulation that no actual murders were carried out". Apparently the judge considered that prosecutors might be worried a jury in this landmark case might be convinced that Ulbricht was non-violent, detached from reality behind a computer, and that his operation was quite different to a conventional drug ring. The murder for hire charge was unnecessary, and it might be a better prosecutorial strategy to use the murder for hire to attack Ulbricht's character as a backdrop for all other charges, to brand him as a violent drug dealer.
Of course there's no visibility to the prosecutorial strategy process but that strategy seems possible, and so I don't think much of the fact that the murder for hire charges were dropped and instead used elsewhere.