Bitcoin Forum

It occures to me with Charlie's arrest that this might be the start of people being arrested for things they did in the early days of bitcoin when it was all still considered "play money". With the blockchain being immutable as it is, the crimes of a few years ago (Stealing 10,000BTC) for example, might now be prosecutable, even though at the time maybe people thought it was worth no more then a 1000 USD. I bet a large number of theives or just lazy/entreprenurial bitcoin early adopters might have done things that sounded like fun at the time but now might be considered serious financial crimes. I wonder for example when Fontas might get found/arrested/prosecuted for securities fraud....

Nothing is ever going to happen to Pirate.

There'll never be a time where they retrospectively prosecute market manipulation. That just doesn't make sense. The markets aren't regulated now and that's that. If and when they are all this stuff will come to an end or be heavily disguised.

The people who are being arrested now allegedly broke laws that were applying at the time. Theft, money laundering, selling drugs, most of us know that's going to cause you some trouble.

I can well imagine that they regarded what they were up to at the time as just a game because it was way out of the spotlight. It's different now. It made some of them very rich. I'll bet they'd happily trade some of that for the old days. My sympathy hovers somewhere around the zero mark.

Charlie was connected to Silk Road. It doesn't matter when. Bitcoin is not on trial here, he is.

But you forum philosophers will find every reason to bark at the man...

Technically everyone is connected to the silkroad one way or another through BTC. You think the largest marketplace for bitcoin transactions doesn't some how relate into other bitcoin related businesses? It's called RICO look it up all they need it .00000000001 of a BTC that originated from a silkroad transaction into 'yourbusinessnamehere' to go after you for money laundering.

You wouldn't be able to prosecute someone based on something committed prior to a law being passed directly prohibiting what that action was. That would almost be the equivalent of trying to prosecute someone for a crime they hadn't yet committed.

More victimless "criminals" having the boot stamping on their face forever. Just a matter of time before every single localbitcoins seller is prosecuted for not harming anyone, because "economic liberty must be destroyed"!

Were the guys that DPR put hits on not victims?

1) "Dread Pirate Roberts" is nothing more than a pseudonym the government was able to co-opt once it seized SR's physical servers to use it as a honeypot and identity theft weapon. Identity theft, which it has the sum total of all prosecuted criminals' tactics, on how to execute, itself.
2) Nobody was in the least danger of getting killed or harmed whatsoever, as all the "hitmen" were government agents or bad Samaritans (like the "hitman" that RCMP claimed they couldn't find) and the government's ability to act as "DPR" and manufacture out of whole cloth a tie of that pseudonym to Ross Ulbricht, or anyone on the internet for that matter, establishes reasonable doubt.
3) Guilt by association is indefensible on every level. At the logical extreme, are you are willing to be executed for using a currency also used by mass murderers? Goodbye homo sapiens.
4) Guilt until proven innocence is indefensible.

allegedly.



 

I don't think the government would think of it like 'retroactive'. For example with Pirate, (not DPR but the ponzi scheme pirate) he argued in court that the SEC didn't have standing as Bitcoin wasn't real money, (and it wasn't at the time) but a judge says, "Looks like money, smells like money, buys like money- it's money" and just like that Bitcoin came under SEC regulations. It might feel retrospective, but the government could easily say if bitcoin is money, then it's money since the day satoshi powered up his first copy of the bitcoin software. So it would feel retroactive.

I also don't have much sympathy, but thats neither here nor there.

The U.S. is a fascist police state (http://thedailybell.com/editorials/34783/Wendy-McElroy-The-Reason-Police-Brutality-Is-Rising/). Stick around at your own risk. This goes for anyone btw, not just BTC hodlers.

edit: btw. they could arrest anyone who ever held a bitcoin. Just claim that they were transferred to you one time from a s/d address. The burden of proof is on you. To hell with the constitution and habeas corpus!
.

This won't be the last "early adopter" to get arrested for playing around on the Silk Road. Now they have DRP by the short and curlies, he could be dropping all kinds of names ... all speculation of course.

I think most american's hate freedom, they prefer regulation and security the liberty imagined in the constitution is for the "nuts" as they call Ron Paul type people. I even heard Ron once complain how hard it is to sell freedom to american's, lets face it most hate the concept and want less of it regarless of what they say just look at the actions of normal american's it's all soviet style regulations they want. So yes I expect more arests and I hope I'm wrong I'm one of the "Ron Paul Nuts"

Unprosecuted systemic election tampering and violence against Ron Paul/libertarians at Republican conventions does not mean most Americans hate freedom, it just means the totalitarians in unchecked power do, which is obvious.

I said it before and I'll say it again: Bitcoin will NEVER be outlawed in the U.S. or anywhere in the "western world".

They will, rather, use their massive surveillance apparatus to silently show up one morning at your house, shoot your dog, and "arrest" you for your alleged "connection" to s/d. This is much easier for them and you see a very similar thing already happening to protesters in Europe and around the world.
Your guns/plane-tickets should rather be ready before that happens!

I'd say most Americans lack a knowledge of what freedom means, from a constitutional perspective. They've been raised (as was I!)  in this system with all the messages and such... Most never really question what they're taught. They just follow the herd, keep their heads down, follow celebrities.

"waking up" as it were, takes a lot of effort and can be frankly painful. Most people resist it with everything they have.

Waking up will take something other than a bunch of internet che guevara wannabes, who btw got his ass holed in while in the jungles of bolivia because reality turned out a little different than his fantasies.

Your kind are the easiest to manipulate. This kind of juvenile bullshit 'rah rah rah fite da powa' is not freedom, neither is it 'exercising your rights'. It's just a whole lot of bitching.

Fish rots from the head. Head of democracy is supposed to be level-headed, courageous and responsible people who have some back bone. Since we got a bunch of internet cunts acting the role, you are the greatest contributor to the degradation of democratic values and freedom - simply because you don't have what it takes to deserve them.

Look to yourself before getting mouthy with the 'establishment'. Can't even take a breather to stop bitching and barking at 'THE MAN'.

Democracy? LOL.

Have you personally experienced and lived in any other form of governance that even attempts at such things?

LOL being a mouthy ass critic is fun until you actually have to face the reality of your words. Little pussies who take potshots at their posh surrounding are in for a rude surprise, just like that coward snowden.

+1

One of the very first bitcoin transactions I did was over PayPal.  The Vietnamese kid (?) got all screwed up with PayPal.  After I had the BTC, sent him some extra $US so he could un-fuck himself and break free of PayPal.  He kindly sent me the money back when this was accomplished.  (This probably gave us both a somewhat false sense of the community...oh well.  It was a calculated risk, and $20 to me was probably a lot more to most people in Vietnam.)

Anyway, it would never give me pleasure to steal anyone's Bitcoin, identity, $US, bucky-balls, or anything else.  I think the last thing 'stole' was a balsa-wood airplane to which I affixed the wrong price tag when I was about 10.  It still bothers me 35 years later.  Someone who did find these things fun is someone who well might be inclined to do it again.  Frankly I'm happy to have them identified at least (so I can avoid them), and I'm sure not going to shed to many tears for them if they need to pay for their indiscretions.  At least if the punishment fits the crime.

Shrem engaged in known criminal activity with the intent of enriching himself, but he was providing a service which was in demand and not engaging in straight theft of fraud against individuals from what I read.  Someone who flat out steal from people is much worse in my book.  Even if it is for 'less than $1000 worth of play money' and even if it was several years ago.

I don't think the FBI arrested him for "mucking about with bitcoins for a giggle". Not saying he is innocent or guilty of anything, just that the charge sheet is unlikely to read "having fun".

I really dont think something like that would even be close to fair, convicting someone for stealing an item when the item was worth $1 is much different when $1,000,000 (if the thief is being convicted for stealing $1,000,000). That is completely unfair -the loss the victim suffered should be based on the exchange rate at the time. Thats like say stealing a penny, but then there's is a massive copper shortage, and pennies are now worth 100x their original face value. Would the thief be convicted for stealing the original face value at the time it was stolen, or the new much higher value? I think the first is WAY more fair. Pretty far shot example, but it's the same concept.

Life isn't fair.

The victim is very likely out $1M.

Some God damn fucking tweaker scum stole an old riding tractor from me a while ago.  He probably got $1 for it at the scrap yard.  It was worth 100x that to me because it had sentimental value and I had plans for it.

As soon as you start doing stupid and criminal things you are responsible for the losses that result as far as I am concerned.  Don't like it?  Don't steal from people.

a question though, since you deal in FIAT to buy things you are effectively stealing from others by every transaction due to  nature of FIAT. FIAT steals work/value from individuals.....by a myriad of scheme e.g. no competition of currency, differential of taxation, quantitative easing, only state issuers. It's merely we are educated to look upon the en-masse stealing of use of state issued FIAT as legitimate.

I know what you mean by "stealing" and I agree, but thats a very obvious clear form of stealing that is no where near the stealing/acquisition of value and wealth transfer made by every transaction by every FIAT actor.

It's a huge stretch to say knowingly and willingly advertising/selling bitcoins on an illegal drug website is simply "playing around with bitcions".

This arrest has nothing to do with bitcoin or early adopters or any such thing. It has to do with people willingly and knowingly being involved with illegal drug sales.  Regardless of what your views are on the war on drugs, everyone should have the brain power to know they are still illegal.

Forget illegal. This is what happens when a bunch of weak ass kids in 20 something year old bodies pretend they got it all made and try to run their 'crypto empire' from behind a laptop.

Deal wit it, bitches 8)

Firstly, when the bills are inscribed with 'in tvbcof we trust' I'll take a little more personal responsibility for the scam.

Secondly, you are talking to a guy who has been dicking around with PM's for over a decade and BTC for what is now a relatively long time.  This for a reason.  I am not satisfied with certain aspects of our mainstream monetary systems myself and have been more active than most in exploring alternatives.

Thirdly, I've only taken out one bank loan in my life (to buy an FZR400), and I bought CD's to automatically pay it off.  I paid for school by working in the summers.  I thus don't contribute to the money supply at all.  I do hold some money in the bank which allows them to inflate the money supply by giving loans to other suckers to buy overpriced housing and such, but I try to avoid even that and a bulk of my wealth is not situated where it can be sucked into the shadow banking system.

Sounds like you are a bit butt-hurt about not getting in a bit earlier and making some money.  Deal wit it, Bitch 8)

Yours,

  Che G.

LOL this bitch. Predictable asspain when getting told off doesn't even begin to cover this response.

How many of the 10k+ btc holders are known?

All of them:

• Satoshi Nakamoto
• Mt Gox
• Bitstamp
• Max Keiser
• Roger Ver
• Eric Voorhees
• Winklevoss twins
• FBI

;D Just kidding of course, but there can't be too many more than that.

Sweeping up all of the early adopter coins and taking over the system is a potential risk for Bitcoin. Hopefully most early adopters have stayed under the radar despite these high-profile examples. A solution to the confiscation problem might be in order too.

Or Zhou Tong.

Pretty obvious name for an obvious government agent. Welcome to ignore.

Funny thing... I have lived in Russia, under a... Different attempt at democracy. This was 2007. Quite a learning experience.

I don't sit around bitching about that man. I quietly recognize there are problems, and few of the general public seem to care. I never said I had any knowledge of how to change things.

Let's remember that Charlie Shrem admitted ON THIS FORUM that he was a member of the Rothschild family. That, and the fact he was able to move large sums around and clear regulatory hurdles before anyone else means he's connected.

This whole event is just theater; psychological warfare. Are you buying it?

 :(

Why dont they arrest Kim Jong Un ?

Care to show this post? I doubt there is one...

If he's not already made bail and is enjoying a drink at his club it's probably bullshit.

Which one ? Dpr or pirate@40? =))))

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=67452.msg782294#msg782294

I don't think that is correct. I would agree with 'just like that, Bitcoin-denominated securities came under SEC regulations'. Just as do FRN-denominated securities, while FRNs themselves do not.

Pot. Meet kettle.

I stand corrected :P and I trust you a little more.

His response was to well-known board weirdo Atlas/Jon/Boss etc who was the Dank of his day. I'd take that admission with a grain of salt.