Bitcoin Forum

First, read the articles at these links:

http://www.morningnewsusa.com/three-bitcoin-traders-arrested-in-florida-238060.html

http://www.dnaindia.com/world/report-three-arrested-in-florida-over-bitcoin-money-laundering-charges-1960172

http://www.theverge.com/2014/2/7/5390782/three-bitcoin-traders-arrested-in-florida-on-money-laundering-charges

Summary of those links is that the in Florida, the state decided to go after some localbitcoin traders for money laundering after setting up a live in person exchange.

Bitcoin is not cocaine. Bitcoin is not crack. It is not cannabis. It is not stolen guns with the serial numbers filed off.

There are a variety of forces that fear technology they do not understand.
There are a variety of forces that fear any technology that breakdowns international borders and barriers.

We, the people who support bitcoin, need to come out in the defense of the guys who were arrested in Florida and support bitcoin.

Entrapment has been and always will be a common tactic amongst law enforcement in America.

If they know people wan't prostitutes they will set up fake prostitution stings , if they know people want drugs they will have undercovers selling drugs, if they know people want to launder their illegally gained funds they will set up sting ops that would attract those type of people.

I don't think this is an attack on bitcoin so much,  just another example of police going undercover and offering illegal things/services and then see who bites.

What "illegal things" were offered by the undercover lawn enforcement orificer to the bitcoin seller? It was just an exchange of bitcoin for dollars. It's clearly just another case of flat out persecution. The only criminals here are the costumed thugs who kidnapped these men at gunpoint and locked them in cages for absolutely no justifiable reason. Those men harmed no one. There is no victim here. There is no loss and no injury and no fraud. Therefore, there is no crime.

Florida is an ideal pro-dollars state. The reason is, it has lots of retirees who are on Social Security. Retire to Florida the saying used to be. And that's what thousands of elderly people have done.

The state has been living off the money those retirees spend, and neither the retirees or the state want anything to do with a form of trade that could destroy money and their way of life.

Think of it. If Bitcoin became popular, and people started using it in place of money in a big way, we could actually see a collapse of the money system. That would mean the collapse of both the resources for the retired elderly, and the state as well.

While this will not likely happen for some time, Florida is having nothing to do with it. They are "nipping it in the bud" so to speak, and trying to earn some free money off the accused, who probably won't get their money back even if the charges are dropped.

:)

Yes they fear it and they have good reason to.

Don't expect the Powers That Be to go down without a fight.  And they will fight dirty, and they will probably win for the most part, but just keep your head down and try not to get busted like these dudes were, when doing nothing wrong.

Incompetent politicians and law enforcement always end up blaming the messenger.
Thats why I think bitcoin should have kept a low profile all along.

I wouldn't jump to conclusions from the sparse facts in these news stories.  I'd like to see the actual complaints.  The media often gets things completely wrong.  One story, for instance, claims they're using the state equivalent of the statute used on Charlie Shrem, but doesn't actually say which statute (there are two charges in that complaint) or what part of it, or what they're actually alleging other than that people sold Bitcoin.

You missed a key part of the story where the undercover agent told the bitcoin seller that he was going to use the bitcoins to purchase stolen credit card information.  Thats the key part in this case, and probably the only reason an arrest was/could be made.  It's one thing to exchange bitcoins for cash, it's another thing to do it when the buyer specifically tells you he intends to use the bitcoins for illegal reasons and you STILL go through with the trade.

"According to court documents, the agent told Michelhack that he wanted to use the Bitcoins to purchase stolen credit cards online. "
http://krebsonsecurity.com/2014/02/florida-targets-high-dollar-bitcoin-exchangers/


Like I said earlier, it's a legal form of entrapment and it's something law enforcements do for all sorts of illegal things.  The issue here isn't so much bitcoin , but selling bitcoin to someone who told you they would be used for a crime.

The REAL question for us is, of course, is crime still crime if it is legal crime?

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=456023.msg5042254#msg5042254

:)

I think your logic is a bit off, even if Florida is truly anti-bitcoin. If Bitcoin became popular, it would still be spent just like money and sales tax would still be collected at the retail level, so Florida would not make any less of their revenue. Only case where Florida would not make revenue, is if laws came down that said Bitcoin is treated as a commodity and therefore when you bought something with it, it would be more so considered a trade of one good for another and no sales tax would be collected in that case (I believe).

http://www.scribd.com/doc/205808113/Def-Espinoza

http://www.scribd.com/doc/205808118/Def-Reid

What you say is true. However, the use of Bitcoin, being decentralized, would cause such an increase of hard-to-track under-the-table activity, that if it were in widespread use, Bitcoin could change the whole appearance of money movement and trading. It might even cause the PEOPLE to review how they are being misrepresented by all the government officials, none of which obeys his/her oath of office. Nobody who is satisfied with things the way they are wants that.

:)

Let's not jump to conclusions. But let's also examine a whole bunch of things going on behind the scenes. Government doesn't want to make any more ripples - and certainly no waves - in the thinking of the people than they have to.

When you look at how fast Bitcoin has come into somewhat popular use, you can see that anything that government does regarding it will start to cause a stir. And this is good. Government needs to be examined with a microscope. Why? Because if government were good, if money were acting rightly for people, Bitcoin wouldn't have become as popular as it has as fast as it has.

:)

This is an interesting point and one that I missed the first time I read the story.

Well, ok, but so what?  If I go to a hardware store and tell the clerk that I'm buying this drill bit so that I can drill holes in my neighbor's tires, is the clerk somehow criminally responsible for selling me the drill bit?  The clerk sold me a tool, and how I use it is my responsibility, not his.

I'm going to love watching how the State of Florida tries to base a prosecution on this nonsense.

But yes, I know...we're talking about Florida...Nick Navarro still working there?  ;o)

If the clerk knows/believes that you are actually planning on using the drill bit to commit a crime? Then yes.

make crimes illegal and people will stop doing that

"MICHELHACK'S PHONE NUMBER WAS INCLUDED IN THE POSTING BUT REDACTED IN THIS AFFIDAVIT."

But then they fail to redact his address and phone number from the first page of the affidavit.  How nice.

If the law worked like that we would be in paradise and 90% of the henchmen jobless.  8)

Crazy stuff.  Attack what is new. BTC

I will agree that Bitcoin does make it harder to track under the table activity in a way, but I have read many news articles stating the US Dollar is still the easiest way to perform any "illegal" actives. While Bitcoin may cause the people to review the government, that is doubtful. I fully agree that most government officials act in their own best interest and not in the best interest of the people they are supposed to represent, but I hope people will finally wake up on their own. If Bitcoin happens to be that catalyst, then so be it. If not, something should eventually come along.

In a normal case of entrapment, everyone involved knows the product is illegal.  Bitcoin is not illegal.

Unless there's more to this than just selling Bitcoin, which is a commodity, not a recognized form of money that goes through the banking system, this would be setting people up for something they had no reason even to believe was illegal, because this is a completely novel interpretation of the law.

Assuming, that is, that there is nothing more than selling Bitcoin involved here.

What a horribly written document.  Of course, most documents written by police are.  The facts alleged here, though, are that they arranged a meet with this guy where they told him they were going to use Bitcoin to buy stolen credit card numbers from Russian criminals.  In other words, he knew the purchase was going to go toward criminal activities.

Seriously, people, anyone who ever sells Bitcoin, if someone tells you something like that, tell them to GTFO.  That person is either an idiot or a cop.


And this sting used exactly the same rationale.  The undercover officer told the suspect he intended to purchase stolen credit card numbers with the Bitcoin.  That doesn't sound very smart to me.  Anyone who hears that and then goes ahead with it anyway is at best aiding and abetting.

I suspected there was more to this than just selling Bitcoin.  The worrisome aspect is if this ends in something other than a plea deal, it might set a bad precedent that selling Bitcoin does, in fact, constitute "money transmittal."  I think buying Bitcoin, if done as a business, might, because you'd actually be delivering money.  Someone selling Bitcoin, though, is just selling a commodity, more like someone selling stuff on Amazon.

Knowing that the person you're selling bitcoin to is using them as a means to make an anonymous purchase of stolen credit card information would be considered aiding in money laundering as far as I see it.  Selling bitcoin to someone is fine,  selling bitcoin to someone who has told you he's converting his dollars so he can buy stolen credit card information with the bitcoins and he's told you this multiple times over a 2 month span is where things start to turn illegal.

Same would be true if someone approached you with cash and told you the money was stolen so he needed to exchange it for your cash so it wouldn't come back to him, that would be a similar situation.  Trading cash isn't illegal, but in that situation you'd be helping someone launder money and you'd be aware of it since they told you the reason for the exchange.

So just to clarify, a lot of articles are leaving out the part about the undercover cop telling the bitcoin seller he needed the bitcoin to buy stolen cc info with it, supposedly the undercover agent said this multiple times over a 2 month span so the bitcoin seller has little excuse for saying he "didn't know"

Florida and NY are the two states that always go after payment processors who don't have state licenses to operate. Avoid those 2 states at all costs or pay off their corrupt legislators to give you licenses. LE posing as Bitcoin traders and trying to get somebody to trade over $10k with them for no ID so they can extort them with laundering charges and seize all their money was bound to happen.

Except they didn't do just that.  They approached them claiming to want to buy Bitcoin to commit outright crimes.  But yes, New York is the most likely state to simply go right after Bitcoin sellers for no other reason than just selling Bitcoin.  These Florida LEAs felt it necessary to do a sting.  Otherwise, they'd have just arrested them the first time they showed up and sold a small about of Bitcoin.

How smart could these dudes have been?  "Hey, mon, I'm not a narc, really!  I just want to buy this coin to go commit a bunch of crimes!  You okay with that, brah?"  And these clowns agreed to do it.

Thanks for posting links to the complaints.

It is interesting that the description of Bitcoin was fairly accurate and concise. That surprised me some.

I laughed when I read "Special Agent Ponzi, United States Secret Service, determined that Michaelhack's fee was ...". Is that his real name? That's hilarious!

While there are certainly elements of standard criminal prosecution here, along the lines of the stolen credit cards issue...it feels as though the simple act of selling BTC for profit is really in question.  It would seem that BTC should be treated like any other asset under capital gains laws, but the "money laundering" aspects are really not clear at this point...could the simple act of buying and selling BTC in and out of fiat alone for profit become a crime...?  Applying existing law to unprecedented economic developments and technology is always a challenge, but it seems as though there could be some very real cause for concern regarding who may get caught up in the crossfire of transition.  At least until the laws are clarified regarding application to digital currency.

I assumed it was an alias to protect his true identity since he's involved in undercover sting operations.

That is the least important part of this case.

No because they don't arrest people for breaking the law.  They arrest them for breaking the law when they feel they have a strong enough case for a conviction.  And a jury probably wouldn't convict someone for selling $301 of bitcoin.

My god some people are here are clueless...a lot of you.

Frankly, a vig like that sounds to me very indicative that defendant knew something was shady and was therefore charging extra.  Who would agree to a fee that large who wasn't up to something (or in this case a cop).

This may be the least important part of the story to you, but it is an absolutely critical part of the money laundering case.  There is no way they would have indicted these guys for money laundering without that.  Even if they had, the prosecutor would drop the charge to avoid the embarrassment of an acquittal or, worse, a dismissal.

However, I agree that this is not particularly relevant to the charge of running an unlicensed money transfer business. One thing that is unclear from these indictments is whether the sting was intended to uncover money laundering or just unlicensed money transfer. 

It will be interesting to see whether these cases go to trial.  It seems plausible to me that they will want to use these cases, in which a conviction will be relatively straightforward, to establish a precedent.  If they truly just wanted to nab these two guys, then I would expect expect the defendants to plead out.  The prosecutor might not offer them a reasonable plea deal if they want the precedent for future, murkier situations, such as cases connected to Silk Road.

If US law enforcement keeps up this kind of bullshit, they will succeed in forcing the Cash->Bitcoin market underground.

If they crack down hard enough on LocalBitcoins, an equivalent darknet site will pop up where people send cash in mail to buy their coins.

Exactly.  A plea deal would say they were just going after shutting down bad actors.  Not offering a plea and going out of their way to prosecute would indicate they actually want to establish a precedent that simply selling Bitcoin is operating an unlicensed money transmitting business, so as to be able to pull in a wider dragnet at some later date.

I have to say that if the claims in the complaint are factually true (always a big if), these two clowns have done Bitcoin a grave disservice themselves.  If someone comes up to you and says they want you to sell them Bitcoin so they can commit open crimes with it, and you facilitate it, YOU are a criminal yourself, you are not doing Bitcoin any favors, and THE GUY IS PROBABLY A COP.

New technology has always intrigued and scared government. In the end they win, by finding a way to regulate it and finally accept it under their own (winner takes it all) terms.

If anyone finds updates or followups on these FL stories, please post so we can track progress and precedent. 

I live pretty close to Miami and this was big news for anyone involved, especially the LocalBitcoins crowds that do alot of local business. I can't believe such a victimless-crime is being prosecuted, and now I'm sure they seized all his assets under the money laundering laws.

Found a more in-depth description of what they alleged happen...


Source: http://www.informationweek.com/security/security-monitoring/florida-sting-nabs-alleged-bitcoin-money-launderers/d/d-id/1113767

 ???

There is no reason to read articles about the court documents when you can read the court documents directly:

True, but some people don't speak legalese nor do they want to spend an hour reading it.

They are not written in legalese and they are fairly short -- not much longer than that article you linked to. Also, the article never even mentions Special Agent Ponzi.

Lot of 7th Graders on this forum.

You're right, I didn't read the complaint because I had already read the article... But thanks for sharing.

Buying stolen credit card numbers is not a victimless crime.

That's being charitable.  They're written at the reading comprehension level of a pig, since that's who wrote them.

HAHAHA

Where does it say he was even involved in buying stolen credit card numbers? Other than the cops shoving that into the report to give the media something to vilify him and the bitcoins.

In the goddamn criminal complaints!

http://www.scribd.com/doc/205808113/Def-Espinoza
http://www.scribd.com/doc/205808118/Def-Reid

Did you even bother reading them?  Jesus Christ.

Maybe take a moment to really read the context of the complaints, or are you in 7th grade?

it sure is cannabis.  tell people not and they'll be like.  WELL MY DOLLARS ARE CANNABIS FUCK U

Yes.

It's a stupid law but they would be guilty of money laundering by "cleaning dirty money."

However, there were no actual stolen credit card numbers involved in this alleged crime.

Heh, they used the "DPR Seized Coins" address (in all caps) as the example.

It will be interesting if the defendant testifies that he can always tell when someone is lying, so he knew the buyer didn't know anyone in Russia. 

Life is easier if you don't let people know that you know they are lying.  With that philosophy, one no longer has to hear the child-like response, "prove I'm lying". 

If a customer informs a gun shop that they need a buy a gun so they can rob bank, and the gun shop assists the customer in acquiring the gun, the gun shop has committed a crime even if the customer is stopped before they get to the bank and commit their crime.

Robbing a bank at gunpoint isn't a victimless crime, so knowingly assisting the thief in acquiring a gun for the purpose of robbing the bank isn't a victimless crime even if there is no actual bank robbery that occurs.

The entrapment defense in the United States has evolved mainly through case law. Two competing tests exist for determining whether entrapment has taken place, known as the "subjective" and "objective" tests. The "subjective" test looks at the defendant's state of mind; entrapment can be claimed if the defendant had no "predisposition" to commit the crime. The "objective" test looks instead at the government's conduct; entrapment occurs when the actions of government officers would usually have caused a normally law-abiding person to commit a crime. (wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entrapment))

Because this is based on a lie by the undercover agent with no material criminality such as drugs being offered, the state will have a hard time proving that the defendant "knew" it was a crime.  At that point, the state will likely bring up a burden of "suspicion"; but, being based on a lie it is itself subjective and likely to become an issue in a criminal defence.  Can a person really be convicted with a 1st degree felony for failing to be suspicious of a statement that is in fact a lie (not truly criminal)?  

EDIT: IANAL
 

But what if there is no actual bank? Who's the victim?

In this case there isn't even an intended victim or planned victim or attempted victim. The alleged victim is imaginary.

It's generally accepted in philosophy that to "know" something implies that the belief is actually true. (See http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/epistemology/)

Your link has more details. Cops are still jerks, for entrapment. Luring people to commit crimes then arresting them is always going to be wrong in my book, but you are right that the issue is that cops are jerks ... but this is not an outright attack on the bitcoin itself.

Thank you for your link.

The sad reality is that he's being pressured to plead, which is how the vast majority of criminal cases end up.  There are many cases where people plead, and were later proven innocent (e.g., through dna testing). 

But, you're right that he's unlikely to testify.  Nevertheless, if it goes to trial, I think defence should focus on the case being based on a lie fabricated by the undercover, for the reasons stated above, including entrapment and to challenge the "burden of suspicion". 

There are a minority who are good at detecting lies, as there are a minority who have a lot of memories when they were very young (like 2).  I've learned that the majority who cannot do either tends to believe that no one can do either, despite these phenomenons being proven. 

In any case, defence wouldn't need to prove that he knew he was lying, but only that he could believe that he knew he was lying, because the case is built around the state of the mind of the accused.  Read the affidavit (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=456860.msg5083625#msg5083625).  With a jury, it would be hard to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he didn't believe he was lying because nearly all of us at one time or another was certain when someone was lying to us.  Can you detect a bragger? 

Is there case law and a supreme court challenge establishing this? 

When there is a claim that someone assisted a crime, it is usually a real crime that occurred.  It is bad enough that we've muddied the waters with conspiracy to commit a crime charges, which I've read some and been convinced that the accused in a few of these cases would never of tried to actually commit the alleged crimes.  But, now you're suggesting assisting someone who is conspiring to commit a crime, creating additional degrees of separation from an actual crime. 

That may be how recently enacted laws are written.  But, without case law and particularly a supreme court ruling, it's not clear that accusations that someone assisted someone lying about conspiring to commit a crime is a solid argument in court. 

Interesting quote from 896.101: "This subsection does not preclude the defense of entrapment."

lol

Yup from a straight reading of the complaint those saying "entrapment" obviously have a definition of "if the cop doesn't tell you he is an undercover cop and in any way tricks you" = entrapment.  In the real world it doesn't come within a mile of entrapment.  For those thinking it rises to an entrapment defense .... cops can lie to you.  If this is the first time that truth has crashed into your reality well it is good to learn it before you are in a court room.

However the flip side is the money laundering charge doesn't even seem to hold water.  I am not saying it is a weak case, I am saying the the the basic material fact of the charge aren't represented. I mean the prosecutor has better chance of indicting for the murder of a person who isn't dead.   Unless there is more than what is in the complaint, I can't see it even surviving the first motion from the defense.  Honestly I don't think the prosecutor could get the grand jury to indict, even if they were half asleep, so that is a plus for the defense.

If the ML charges go away it gets a lot more interesting. Is the state of FL going to go ahead with the unlicensed money transmitter charge on an otherwise legit exchange?  If so then the hyperbolic title of the thread is 100% spot on.   So honestly I really do hope the ML charges get dismissed because then it just comes down to a black and white case on if two citizens of Florida can exchange dollars for Bitcoins.

I'd rather the test case for money transmitter charges have more sympathetic defendants. But it'll be interesting nonetheless.

AGREED
IT's just a tool what that stupid all these people afraid of...

I just described this case that way earlier today, before even reading this thread.  I reminded someone that many people demonized the Internet as a place that would enable gambling and child porn.  This debate rose to the US congress in the late 90s. 

Similarly, the VCR was supposed to be a tool for copyright infringement.  The result of this case is what helped to raise awareness of our fair use rights, only to be marginalized and regulated via the DMCA later on. 

The bigger problem, however, is that the money laundering laws created in the 80s to target "drug kingpins" were a time bomb waiting to go off as they gradually ensnared more and more innocent people who have no interest in drugs or profiting from them in any way.  Take the $10k limit established back then.  Is $10k in the 80s the same as $10k 30 years later?  Inflation ensures that more and more people are impacted every year -- until cash and privacy are eliminated for all citizens. 

Now comes bitcoin.  It is getting double wacked as both a new technology, and at a time when the dragnet of the money laundering laws has increased so wide that the % of people being targeted that most of us would consider "good people" is increasing rapidly.  In fact, triple wacked because bitcoins leaves out the central banks, which have been the most outspoken opponents of it.  Quadruple wacked when you consider how governments have increasing used central banks for political means by printing money to buy votes (the primary cause of the high inflation rate in Argentina). 

Hopefully these cases raise awareness not only for the benefit of bitcoin, but also to help push back some of our laws so that good people are not ensnared in them.  What good is a war on drugs when the end result is a war on people who don't use illegal drugs, people who support the real efforts that arrest real international drug traffickers to stop the drug trades themselves for cocaine, heroin, etc,..., but are people who use currencies, people who buy pizzas, people who pay rent/mortgage. 


 

Before I answer that question, let me ask one of my own.

If I publicly threaten to murder someone, and I plan to murder someone, and I intend to murder someone, and that person is unaware of this threat, plan, and intent, is there a victim prior to my actually committing the murder?

Not necessarily. There's an intended victim. There's a planned victim. But nothing in what you said shows that there's an actual victim.

That said, given that you made your threat public, maybe one of the members of the public who heard about the threat (say, a family member of the intended victim) could be considered a victim.

Now your turn.

What if there's no actual bank? Then there isn't even an intended or planned victim, let alone an actual victim.

If you disagree, then who's the victim?

How did we leap from trading bitcoins to conspiracy to commit murder?  Espinoza is not a murderer or a bank robber.  He wasn't trading lethal weapons.  He was trading currency, the same thing we use to order a pizza and pay our bills.  The only one expressing any illegal intent in his case was the government.  And Espinoza showed no interest in stealing credit cards, and quite possibly found their outlandish claims to be obviously ridiculous.  The entire accusation against him is that he BELIEVED every word coming from the government's mouth as if it was an indisputable truth and had INTENT to promote their claimed agenda.  But, there is no evidence in the affidavit that he did either. 

It would be entirely different if the undercover agents were a witness to him trying to support credit card theft, KNOWING that the people he was dealing with were really credit card thieves.  But, the only FACT in this case as spelled out by the affidavit is that the government is NOT a credit card thief. 

They government needs to PROVE that he BELIEVED their lies in order to build a case that relies on this premise.

It isn't alleged, so far as I can tell, that he even had INTENT to help the undercover agent steal the credit card numbers, since the undercover agent claimed that the numbers were already stolen.

I guess the argument is that he had the intent to commit money laundering.

My point exactly.  It's one thing for a undercover to lie to maintain his cover so he can be a WITNESS to a crime.  But, it's completely different for the undercover to fabricate an imaginary crime and build the case that the accused believed those fabrications AND acted to promote the crime.  If he gave evidence he believed the fabrications, he could still have an entrapment case, because entrapment doesn't mean the accused didn't commit a crime. It means he wouldn't of committed it ordinarily of the government didn't entrap him.  But, in this case, he took no action even indicating he believed their lie, let alone took an action to actually promote the purchase of credit card numbers. 

I am not legal expert, but from a logical point of view, this does not make sense.

For instance.  If I have a transaction history of my bitcoins.  Bought in X and paid y$.  Today I sell X for z$, then funds that I receive a fully accounted for.  The only crime I could fathom is that the buyer cannot explain where he received his $100.000 from.

What if the following happened, if my neighbour sold his car for $100.000 and paid me $100.000  for a piece of paper that has a drawing that i drew on it?  Where is the crime?  If my neighbour values my piece of paper at $100.000, then who can say anything?

What's next, now the law will tell me how I will spend my hard earned cash????

Sounds like some political bullshit.

Well, this happens all the time. Adult cops pose as underage children, fake drugs are purported to be the real thing...


The underlying crime which was attempted/solicited/conspired would have to be money laundering, not credit card theft.

Still, I don't see how they'd do it.

Well, these weren't neighbors.

If instead of a single transaction between you and your neighbor, you were in the business of selling cars, then the crime would be running an auto dealership without a license.

Please understand, I don't necessarily disagree with you nor do I necessarily believe that the actions of law enforcement in these two cases are justified.  I find the discussion to be interesting and the debate to be mentally stimulating.  As such, I'm taking the opposite side of this discussion because "Yeah! What he said!" doesn't allow for much of a conversation, nor does it leave much opportunity for education, or expansion of knowledge.  The act of the debate itself helps to draw out possibilities, lines of thought, and deeper understanding that are not possible with simple agreement.  That being said:


Interesting.  In your view, intent to commit murder, threatening murder, and planning to commit murder are all victimless crimes.  As such, until the murder is actually committed and someone's life is actually gone, prosecuting such an individual would be prosecuting someone for a victimless crime?  If that really is your viewpoint, then you're right.  Given the way you look at the world and interpret the activities around you, the individuals in these cases are being subjected to law enforcement actions for a victimless crime.  Looking at the matter from your viewpoint, I'm also unable to see a victim in the actions of the accused individuals in these cases.


Ok, if you are willing to consider as a victim a member of the public who heard about the threat, then we're getting close to having something to work with here. It would appear that the members of law enforcement involved in this case are stating that the accused individuals have an intent to commit money laundering, agreed (or threatened) to commit money laundering, and have planned to commit money laundering.  I'm not sure that they can be charged with actual money laundering, but the question I'm trying to answer isn't what crimes they've committed, but rather whether those crimes (or rather the actions and statements of the accused) are victimless. Since money laundering is used specifically to assist criminals in their endeavors (in this case the purchasing and selling of stolen credit card information), the planned acts of money laundering have, as you stated, intended victims.  If the planned acts of money laundering are not yet committed, but are known about by others, then perhaps a member of the public who hears about the planned act of money laundering (such as the law enforcement officials) can be considered a victim?  Actual stolen credit card information may not have been bought or sold, but if the accused has demonstrated a willingness, intent, and plan to commit money laundering, then anyone who is aware of this willingness, intent, and plan is a victim of the threat of money laundering.

I understand that I'm reaching a bit here (ok maybe more than a bit).  That's mostly because in your worldview intent, planning, and threatening murder is also essentially a victimless crime.  I've already admitted that given your worldview, the accused in these cases are also being charged with victimless crimes.  My previous paragraph is just the best I can do to shoehorn a "victim" into your particular worldview (given your willingness to accept "the public" as a victim of a threat of murder against an individual).

I also recognize that intent to commit money laundering, planning to commit money laundering, and threatening to commit money laundering are neither in the list of charges filed, nor are they likely to be prosecutable crimes (or illegal at all?).  My efforts are not to determine whether or not the accused committed any crimes, but rather to determine whether or not the actions of the accused have a "victim".


I've done the best I can to determine if there is any sort of victim at all given your worldview.  I may have come up short, but its the best I can do.  It will be interesting to see how this plays out in Florida.

The question I'm attempting to answer is "Who's the victim?", not "What is the crime?"

To determine the answer to the question of "Who's the victim?", I first needed to find out if we both identify victims in the same way.  I used an extreme example of intent and threat to commit murder to determine if the person asking "Who's the victim?" would identify a victim in cases where threats and intent exist, but the threatened and intended action has not yet occurred.

Having established a particular viewpoint on the matter, I was then able to return to discussion about the actions surrounding these individuals trading of bitcoins.  That answer applies only to the particular viewpoint expressed by anth0ny.  If someone else would identify some other "victims" in the threat and intent to commit murder, then there would be a some other "victims" in these cases being discussed.

Depending on how they interpret the specific intent requirement in Florida, that might actually be a defense, as silly as it sounds.  Of course, the fact-finder would have to believe or at least have reasonable doubt as to that intent.  For example, suppose the defendant testified that due to his personal knowledge of the buyer, he knew that the buyer was a milquetoast who really wanted to buy embarrassing, but entirely legal porn and made up this story to seem like a badass.

(Incidentally, while this may be a defense against the full monty money laundering charge, there are quite possibly lesser included offenses of money laundering that apply without specific intent.)

At that point, no crime there, unless you buy the state's rather contrived theory about unlicensed money transmitting businesses.  Incidentally, the latter is the far more worrisome potential consequence of this case, especially if adopted at the federal level, and there is some statutory basis for it.

Clearly, in this case, there is no specific victim.  The crime was imaginary and the victims nonexistent.  Similarly, if you tried to hire a hit man to "rub out the guy who ratted on me" and there was no actual rat, there would be no actual victim.  However, murder-for-hire is not a victimless crime.  It inherently intends to have a victim and where one exists, that victim will be harmed.  Similarly, selling stolen credit card numbers is inherently a crime where there are victims, if the crime is completed.

I generally interpret the term "victimless crime" to mean "crimes" where inherently, there are no victims.  So, for instance, purchasing drugs is a victimless crime.  Thinking "bad" thoughts or expressing them is a victimless crime.  Any act which does not impair someone else in the exercise or enjoyment of their rights is victimless, and should never be subject to punishment by the state.

I didn't think we were talking about whether the actions of law enforcement were justified, but were talking about whether or not the alleged crime was victimless.

That said, it doesn't bother me when people disagree with me.


No. Intent to commit murder and planning to commit murder aren't crimes at all. And threatening to commit murder usually has a victim.


It could be.

Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with that.


Great.


I think there's quite a difference between the intended victim being unharmed and the intended "victim" being nonexistent.


No. The stealing of the credit card has intended victims. The money laundering itself is victimless.


Intent to murder is not a crime at all. Planning to murder (if only one person is involved in the planning) is not a crime at all. Threatening murder has a victim.

Attempted murder might, in some cases, not have a victim. But please don't take that to mean that I feel it shouldn't be a crime. If by "attempted murder" you mean trying to kill someone and failing, that should be a crime. If by "attempted murder" you mean trying to kill something that is not a person and succeeding, that shouldn't be (though in at least some jurisdictions it sometimes is).


What I said is that there might be a victim if the public is aware of the threat, and I gave an example of a family member. If someone credibly threatens to kill my spouse, I think it's accurate to say that I've been victimized by that person.


And you agree they don't, right?

The "victim" is imaginary.


Who's the victim in your worldview?


There's no Florida law against victimless crimes, so whether or not there's a victim is really irrelevant.

You agree the money services business charge is a victimless one, right?

In the case being discussed, not only were there were no stolen credit cards, there was not even any intent to steal credit cards.  The two questions being presented are:

Is the actual act of money laundering a "victimless crime"?

Does the demonstrated willingness to commit money laundering have any "inherent victims"?

But what about attempted-murder-for-hire?


So where does money laundering fall?

Yes, that's why I thought the bank robbery example was not very relevant.

A better analogy with bank robbery would be if an undercover cop gave the accused a stack of cash and said, lying, "I just stole this from the bank, here you take it". The charge: (attempted) receipt of stolen property.

Or in the case of murder, if an undercover cop gave the accused a mannequin in a body-bag and said "I just killed this guy, dump him in the river for me." The charge: (attemped) illegal disposal of human corpses.

In either case, I don't see who the victim is.

Another interesting hypothetical is whether or not those people who are praying for Obama to die can be charged with attempted murder. And if so, would that be a victimless crime? But that one isn't really analogous to the money laundering one.

Agreed that would be a better example.  More specifically, if the undercover cop contacted the accused and said, lying, "I just stole this cash from (and mentioned a bank that was widely reported to have been recently robbed), I'd like to use it to purchase (anything legal that the accused might be offering to sell)". Then after the accused agreed to the deal, returned a month later saying, lying, "Here's some more cash from another bank robbery that hasn't been reported by the news yet, can I buy more of (those same legal items that I bought last time)?"  The accused has demonstrated a willingness to accept stolen property in exchange for legal merchandise.

Are those actions victimless? Is that a crime?

From your worldview, I agree there is no victim there.  For some, the public at large are all inherent victims in the concept of money laundering or accepting stolen merchandise.  As such, there is at least an intended (or planned) victim of the actions of the accused.

I like that one.  I'm saving that for the next time I'm having dinner with a group that I know has a wide range of political and social beliefs.  Should make for some very interesting conversation.

Considering that the crime itself is predicated on other crimes, I'd say it really depends on the crime the proceeds of which are laundered.

If, as in this case, the proceeds are presumably either from or going to be used to purchase stolen credit cards, yes, there are inherently victims in the actually completed crime, even if there are no actual victims.

I'm not sure what the term "victimless crime" is supposed to mean under that point of view. You could say "the public at large are all inherent victims" of any crime.

Ah yes, make sure you also include a mixture of people who believe and people who don't believe in the power of prayer. :)

Exactly.  Many people are of that worldview.  The concept of a "victimless crime" only applies when someone is unwilling to view the public at large as a victim (or set of victims), many people feel that there is no such thing as a "victimless crime", since society (and therefore all members of society) is a victim of any crime.

Why don't you ask one of these family members if drug cartels and money laundering used to support their activities are "victimless" crime.

in Mexico alone "more than 60,000 people were killed in drug-related violence from 2006 to 2012, according to Human Rights Watch."

http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/27/world/americas/mexico-violence (http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/27/world/americas/mexico-violence)

I agree with you there too bud.

I don't need to ask them.  I have logic.  As others have pointed out, when alcohol was prohibited, murder related to alcohol smuggling crimes skyrocketed.  Is drinking a beer therefore inherently a heinous crime? 

Obviously not.

Citing the costs prohibition itself creates is not a great argument for prohibition.  In fact, you just cited reasons prohibition is an abject failure and should be abandoned.

You can completely support the "war on physically addicting drugs" and separate money laundering from the laws.  I've seen the destructiveness of physically addicting drugs on people's lives enough to hate the harm they cause, such as heroin and cocaine.  Marijuana does not have these issues, and is less harmful than alcohol, so, like alchohol, should be legal and taxed, with limited personal growth permitted since it is a plant. 

Now, when money laundering laws were introduced, they were introduced with the context you presented, to go after drug cartels.  They promised they would only be used to stop THEIR money laundering activities.  If I believed they could limit the reach to this purpose, I would of supported it hands down.  I would love to stop drug cartels.  But, I knew it was inevitable that what begins this way will eventually reach the common man.  The fact that they didn't tie the reporting thresholds to inflation guaranteed that increasingly small transactions from everyday citizens would be caught up in this, instead of drug cartels. 

Now today, not only are we discussing Espinoza, an ordinary citizen just buying and selling digital assets in transaction amounts that are less than a years wage for the average American, but other non-bitcoin related impacts to ordinary citizens, such as this women's new inability to get gas and diaper money to her son (http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2014/02/chase_bank_stops_accepting_cas.html)!  Did refusing to let her deposit $150 into her son's account stop drug cartels from importing cocaine into the United States? 

There comes a point when the victims are people like Espinoza, this woman and her son.  Clearly, she's a victim of our money laundering laws gone too far.  How do we hold the government accountable for taking away our freedoms?  When did our money become the government's money and the bank's money?  When did we give up the freedom to trade legal items between each other?  Bitcoins are legal, right?  Cash is legal, right?  Haven't Americans, since the founding of the USA, freely traded legal items without interference and opposition from our elected officials? 

We may differ on whether or not we want to stop the drug cartels.  We can differ on whether or not we want to legalize or continue to fight the importation of certain drugs.  Yet, I believe that vast majority of us can agree that bitcoin traders, this mother and her son should not be victims of money laundering laws!

I don't. All drugs should be legal and untaxed, including alcohol. :)

Haha agreed.  I don't think we can have our cake and eat it too though.

Is buying stolen CC numbers a crime? Using the numbers would be but would possession of the numbers be illegal?

It should only be a crime of stupidity once the source of the DB dump is known to AmEx/Visa/MC/Discover. Why? Every time there is a hack of credit card number databases, all the credit card companies have to do is shitcan all the numbers with the merchant field of the transaction showing the hacked merchant. So for example, Target credit card hack: all credit cards with 'Target' charges made to them in the past 60 days, shitcan, issue new card number, 2 weeks later physical card arrives at cardholder's billing address.

Anybody buying a list of invalidated, now effectively random numbers (that they can't use for anything other than toilet paper) is stupid, but the prison industry would sure like to have them as another inmate to profit from.

You're seriously asking this?  Yes, of course it is.  18 U.S.C. § 1029 and a host of related statutes.  I'm not sure which is most commonly prosecuted, but seriously, you're asking if buying stolen credit numbers is a crime or not?  WTF?  Does it take a genius to realize it is?

I don't see anything about buying them. And I only see possession with intent to defraud mentioned.

Umm, except that they don't do that.

They're complicit? Great.

I found this statement to fit in ironically with the "victimless" part of this thread.  To recap, someone stated earlier in this thread that the victims of drug violence are due to the war on drugs rather than drugs themselves.  

The district attorney, unhappy with the grand jury letting the defendant go on capital murder charges, said:

The self-defense laws in Texas are viewed in the mindset of the actor, not the victim, which allows for tragedies to occur when one party is acting lawfully, but it can be reasonably seen as a threat of deadly force by another. However, the Burleson County Sheriff’s Office would not have been there that day if Mr. Magee had not decided to live a lifestyle of doing and producing illegal drugs in his home. Therefore, we will fully prosecute the drug charges against him. This event should wake the community up that drug crimes are not victimless.

Texas Grand Jury Refuses To Indict Homeowner In Shooting Death Of Sheriff’s Deputy (http://www.westernjournalism.com/texas-grand-jury-refuses-indict-homeowner-shooting-death-sheriffs-deputy/)

That's hilarious on several levels.

Well that's circular logic at it's finest. Actual logic: No unconstitutional drug law enforcement in the first place equals no unconstitutional drug law enforcers being shot in self-defense as they induce mortal fear in people who have unconstitutionally banned PLANTS in their homes.

Being a marijuana case, I completely agree in this case.  It is less harmful than alcohol.  The guy had a gun and a plant that doesn't kill anyone. 

Physically addicting drugs are different, though.  There's good reason to hate their impact -- like death, compulsive stealing, etc,...  Drugs like crack spread like an infection.  They enslave people.  Those who distribute them will have ultimate power. It's hard to imagine legalizing them as being perfectly rosy. How do we balance the destructiveness of the war on drugs with the destructiveness of physically destructive drugs (http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/16/health/krokodil-zombie-drug/)? 

To be sure, I don't believe in incarcerating users.  They need rehabilitation, not incarceration.  But, I originally viewed the war on drugs as trying to keep them out of our country.  In your model, you create a legal import business, presumably highly taxed.  At some point, taxes get so high, that tax evasion becomes an issue.  I remember that the document accusing Shem was signed by the Internal Revenue Service, IIRC.  Doesn't tax evasion become an issue?

An, let's not pretend there won't be high taxes.  Just look at cigarettes.  The non-tax price is under $1 per pack. 
 

Indeed, what are the most common products stolen in convenience store armed robberies, along with the money? If you watch enough CCTV videos, it seems to be cigarettes, then alcohol.

But how do you deal with armed robbers? You shoot them. Or you obey "gun control" and get shot/stabbed/beaten yourself because you were legally effectively defenseless.

The issue I'm raising isn't people not paying taxes.  

The IRS replaces the war on drugs.  People think of the Charlie Shrem case as drug related because of silk road.  But, the agent accusing him and signing the filing with the court a "special agent with Internal Revenue Service".  

Isn't this the moral of the story of Al Capone?  

"regulations" and "war" can be used interchangeably.
  


  

They don't what to catch rapers,murders & thieves they want to mess with the citizens. >:(

Regardless where, People like to grab these infomation at the lowest cost by trying to attack famous exchanges, or limit it while they do in umbra.

So we shouldn't rescue the gal from the burning building because she has high cholesterol and will probably die from a heart attack eventually anyway?

The war on success needs to be ended just as well as the war on drugs. But let's not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

People who say we should legalize drugs and tax them need to be corrected (if you look above, I've personally already done so once). But people who say we should legalize drugs and don't mention taxes, don't need to be criticized.

Propaganda is not argument.

Its funny how throughout history, whenever there are wars, there are parties with particular interests profiting immensely from the conflict. Doesn't matter whether we're talking about a war in the conventional sense, where young men are sent to the other side of the world to kill brown people, and in turn risk getting killed themselves, or whether the war is completely stupid, against something as abstract as a chemical structure, which also leads to casualties of war i.e. young people, also quite often brown, locked up in prisons and more or less having their lives destroyed, all for the sake of profits.

Possession of stolen property is against the law.

We don't have this choice, though.  If something gets legalized, it is pretty much a matter of course that it will also be taxed, just like every other form of economic activity.  Now, perhaps this isn't the way it should be, but that's the way it is.  In any event, allowed but taxed is an incremental step in the right direction, and is preferable to prohibited.

So if we had prohibited, allowed but taxed, and allowed and untaxed on our menu of choices, the latter might be the best option.  But we don't.  In fact, it would be damn near a miracle if we even had "allowed but taxed" on our menu.

I'm not sure what you mean. Economic activity is taxed whether it's legal or not.

I'm not saying possessing stolen credit card #'s isn't against the law.  But, most information laws are not based on theft laws.  Copyright infringement, for example, is infringement, not theft.  Judges have become upset when lawyers begin to use the word "theft" in their courts, because legally, copyright infringement has nothing to do with theft.     

Theft is based on the assumption that someone lost a possession.  If your bike is stolen, you no longer have a bike.  Our theft laws are based on physical possessions.  Only recently have we coined the term "intellectual property" do describe man made information based concepts.  That term is not really embedded in our law as property.  It is usually defined as a "right" not property.  Copyright infringement is, in theory, an infringement of one's right to limit copying.  It is not theft.  Patent infringement is even more abstract as it defines a right to limit the creation of objects from concepts rather than defining the right to create an exact replica of an object, like a book.

The ability to purchase product and services using information, such as credit card numbers, is a relatively new concept in law compared to our theft laws.  To be sure, using that credit card to steal money is still likely stealing, because that is money, which is pretty well cemented in theft laws.  But, merely possessing a copy of a number is not theft.  In fact, it is very legal to have a copy of someone's credit card number if they shared it with you.  If it weren't, it would be nearly impossible to accept credit cards online, let alone store them for customer convenience. 




 

sure it is not.
But propaganda is a seed of destruction.

Theft of credit card information is more like theft of trade secrets than copyright infringement.

That said, I'm not saying that possession of stolen credit card numbers is against the law. I couldn't find any law against possession in itself, only possession with intent to defraud.

Hey, let's stop arguing about discussing these silly points and get back to the major discussion.


Is there any other news or statements related to these arrests? Anyone here know them?

We will have to wait and see if they cop a plea or go to trial.

Are they in custody or were they released on bond?

If I'm reading things correctly at http://www.miamidade.gov/corrections/inmate-information.asp then both Espinoza and Reid are still in custody. To get out they need to prove at a Nebbia hearing that the bail premium/collateral is not from an illegal source.

Both criminal complaints had the Nebbia hearing notation.  Sounds correct to me.

They are not fucking around.

Great read +1

For an explanation of Florida, just look for the Twitter feed of "Florida Man."  Basically, someone Googles for "Florida Man" and then posts the stories on Twitter, pretending they're about the world's worst superhero, a guy named "Florida Man."

Almost any news story with a "Florida Man" headline involves an insane, stupid act of some sort.

For instance, top hit on Google News currently:

Florida Man Arrested For FB Post Soliciting $100 Hitman to Kill a Cop (http://www.opposingviews.com/i/society/wrestler-arrested-fb-post-soliciting-100-hitman-kill-cop)

If you are in a bind, send up the Bat signal.  Do not call Florida Man.

even small violations of anything can be treated very/overly seriously