[2020-01-31] Senior Adviser / Operator Of The “Silk Road” Website Pleads Guilty

[hv_]

Senior Adviser To The Operator Of The “Silk Road” Website Pleads Guilty In Manhattan Federal Court

Roger Thomas Clark Was a Key Figure in the Development of Silk Road, Advised Ross Ulbricht on All Aspects of the Criminal Enterprise, and Urged and Facilitated an Attempted Murder-for-Hire
Geoffrey S. Berman, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that ROGER THOMAS CLARK, a/k/a “Plural of Mongoose,” a/k/a “Variety Jones,” a/k/a “VJ,” a/k/a “cimon,” pled guilty today to conspiring to distribute massive quantities of narcotics, a charge arising out of his role as the senior adviser to the owner and operator of the “Silk Road” online illicit black market.  During its operation from 2011 until 2013, Silk Road was used by thousands of drug dealers and other unlawful vendors to distribute illegal drugs and other illicit goods and services to more than 100,000 buyers, and to launder hundreds of millions of dollars derived from those unlawful transactions.  CLARK pled guilty before United States District Judge William H. Pauley III.
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https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/senior-adviser-operator-silk-road-website-pleads-guilty-manhattan-federal-court

[1715150889]

1715150889

[malevolent]

CLARK, 56, a citizen of Canada, pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute narcotics, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

So unlike DPR, Variety Jones at least has a chance of dying outside prison walls.

Since he was arrested over four years ago maybe we'll see him making an AMA on /r/Bitcoin in the near future if he gets sentenced to time served only.

[bryant.coleman]

You can jail everyone who deal with narcotics, and fill the jails with such people. But it is not going to work. Dark markets will remain as long as the demand is there. And with time, they will get more innovative. The governments should treat drug usage as individual choice. Some of the governments (such as those in Uruguay and Portugal) have tried to decriminalize narcotic usage, and it resulted in many positives. Dark markets such as Silk Road made unadulterated drugs available to the users and prevented a lot of overdose deaths. Also, it reduced the incidence of street violence, as they users no longer had to rely on street vendors. 

[Theb]

CLARK, 56, a citizen of Canada, pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute narcotics, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

So unlike DPR, Variety Jones at least has a chance of dying outside prison walls.

Since he was arrested over four years ago maybe we'll see him making an AMA on /r/Bitcoin in the near future if he gets sentenced to time served only.

I don't know how mitigating circumstances work in a guilty plea but Variety Jones is already 56 and assuming that the judge will only sentence him to half of that sentence with no possibility of parole he would be around 66 or 67 that time since the sentencing will happen on May 29, 2020. Him being 66 or 67 years old at that time and maybe also being broke I'm only assuming that he'll only do this AMAs or Interviews if he will be fairly compensated for it. On a side note them being arrested by now won't change a thing in the dark web and hundreds of imitations of Silk Road will always emerge and continue the drug trade from happening their.

[malevolent]

I don't know how mitigating circumstances work in a guilty plea but Variety Jones is already 56 and assuming that the judge will only sentence him to half of that sentence with no possibility of parole he would be around 66 or 67 that time since the sentencing will happen on May 29, 2020. Him being 66 or 67 years old at that time and maybe also being broke I'm only assuming that he'll only do this AMAs or Interviews if he will be fairly compensated for it.

Many have done AMAs without any compensation or to promote a book at most. If he a 10-year sentence, and gets credited for time served since his arrest, he'll be out in 5.5 years. Since he bragged about bribing cops in Thailand I'm guessing he probably has some money stashed away.

[gentlemand]

I remember reading about him in American Kingpin, a book about Silk Road. He seems like a waaay sleazier character than Ross and was instrumental in sending Ross further down the rabbit hole than he probably ever intended.

However he has the luxury of the novelty of the whole thing having worn off and his sentence will reflect that.

[buwaytress]

I don't know how mitigating circumstances work in a guilty plea but Variety Jones is already 56 and assuming that the judge will only sentence him to half of that sentence with no possibility of parole he would be around 66 or 67 that time since the sentencing will happen on May 29, 2020. Him being 66 or 67 years old at that time and maybe also being broke I'm only assuming that he'll only do this AMAs or Interviews if he will be fairly compensated for it.

Many have done AMAs without any compensation or to promote a book at most. If he a 10-year sentence, and gets credited for time served since his arrest, he'll be out in 5.5 years. Since he bragged about bribing cops in Thailand I'm guessing he probably has some money stashed away.

The compensation may not come as cash immediately, but I'm sure many go on to earn from their reputations, interviews and publications. I've actually seen it in my industry myself before. People just become involved, get a few minutes of fame and then get hired because of their name power. They don't necessarily do any of the duties associated with their positions. Just sit there as figureheads with things like "author of ABC" and "central figure of the famous XYZ interview" or "subject of the ABCXYZ investigations".

For sure, there's lots more in this for him than for DPR.

[hv_]

Satoshi still there helping to fix BitCoin getting free from crime ?

 

https://www.coindesk.com/us-doj-calls-bitcoin-mixing-a-crime-in-arrest-of-software-developer

[malevolent]

He is said to have advertised his mixer as a tool to break the law and he is said to have worked with Alphabay. If that is true it's not that surprising he's gotten himself into trouble.

[bbc.reporter]

CLARK, 56, a citizen of Canada, pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute narcotics, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

So unlike DPR, Variety Jones at least has a chance of dying outside prison walls.

Since he was arrested over four years ago maybe we'll see him making an AMA on /r/Bitcoin in the near future if he gets sentenced to time served only.

You know someone has cooperated with the authorities when he gets out of the case with a minimum sentence hehehe. Also, what they did to Ross was excessive. However, did it scare other criminals from creating their own darknet websites?

[hv_]

He is said to have advertised his mixer as a tool to break the law and he is said to have worked with Alphabay. If that is true it's not that surprising he's gotten himself into trouble.

In law and compliance the purpose of doing sth is just enough to get u into jail

[gentlemand]

You know someone has cooperated with the authorities when he gets out of the case with a minimum sentence hehehe. Also, what they did to Ross was excessive. However, did it scare other criminals from creating their own darknet websites?

Not one other darknet type has had a sentence anywhere near Ross's and not one ever will again most likely.

The first man through the door always gets the shotgun emptied in their face.

Everyone else who shuffles through past the ruined cadaver gets a few pellets.

[bbc.reporter]

@gentlemand. However, the government's purpose for his excessive sentence did not work. It did not stop the darknet. I reckon that it might be taken over by real criminals by now.

I heard the Silk Road was a place for freedom of speech and also a community for illegal drugs safety.

[gentlemand]

@gentlemand. However, the government's purpose for his excessive sentence did not work. It did not stop the darknet. I reckon that it might be taken over by real criminals by now.

I heard the Silk Road was a place for freedom of speech and also a community for illegal drugs safety.

I'm sure their prime motivation was revenge for being so brazen, not justice. Hence the sentence.

Nothing will stop the darknet. I'm sure everyone from all angles must know that. They'll get plenty of lovely money to attempt it and the jail companies will receive some lovely money too for whomever they manage to catch.

[bbc.reporter]

It was not revenge. It was for fear and intimidation, I reckon. The government might have been successful to scare away the cryptocoin nerd community, however, it attracted hard criminals. The type that will not be scared of the government.

[gentlemand]

And yet most of the people who have been busted so far looked plenty nerdy to me.

I think they sensed that the tools cryptography provides make criminals out of people who otherwise wouldn't have had the balls or the notion at all.

[Carlton Banks]

He seems like a waaay sleazier character than Ross

I see you are adjusting your, frankly, rather spoilt and ungrateful attitude towards Ross Ulbricht's contribution to the Bitcoin phenomenon. I might venture that Ross wasn't at all sleazy in way, shape or form, and in fact showed a great deal of moral and principled fortitude in creating/briefly running the Silk Road website.


In fact, everyone here owes Ross a great debt of gratitude: Ross & the Silk Road proved Bitcoin as money at a crucial part of the overall story, far more so than Laszlo and the $10,000 pizzas. And certainly more than the gutless sheep who followed the herd out of pure spinless greed, who then have the temerity to administer verbal kicks to the face of those on whose shoulders they are standing.

The darkweb pioneer capitalists were heroes, and those who ride the Bitcoin train yet spit in the faces of those pioneers are no more than a bunch of cowards

[bbc.reporter]

@Carlton Banks. Agreed. I heard the Silk Road forum was also an open place for intelligent economic, political, social discussions. It was a place where its community members can leave and bring some knowledge with them and some drugs hehehehe.

[Betwrong]

~ I heard the Silk Road forum was also an open place for intelligent economic, political, social discussions. It was a place where its community members can leave and bring some knowledge with them and some drugs hehehehe.

You heard it right. I mean the first part of your post. Regarding "some drugs", that's what I was thinking too before actually reading the Silk Road Forum Archives. To my great surprise, there were little to nothing about drugs on that forum. SR Forum looked more like Politics & Society here on bitcointalk. Yes, there was a section called "Drug Safety", or something like that, but the most popular topics were related to Libertarianism, free-market economy, namely, the Austrian School, and stuff like that.

[bbc.reporter]

@Betwrong. It was administered by a person who is not a criminal. He was a physics major, a scientist and he has created the Silk Road to be an experiment on real freedom on the internet. It was not only for the drugs. I reckon the American government punished him severely out of fear of creating a people's movement.