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Bluelighter
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2 Ex-Federal Agents in Silk Road Case Are Charged With Fraud
By BENJAMIN WEISER and MATT APUZZOMARCH 30, 2015
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/31/nyregion/silk-road-case-federal-agents-charges.html
Two former federal agents have been charged with money laundering and fraud stemming from their investigation into Silk Road, the once-thriving black market website for drug dealing, a criminal complaint shows.
The former agents are Carl Mark Force IV, who worked for the Drug Enforcement Administration, and Shaun Bridges, who worked for the Secret Service.
Mr. Force was also charged with theft of government property and conflict of interest, according to the complaint, which was unsealed on Monday in federal court in San Francisco.
The charges stem from the agents’ role in one of the federal investigations into Silk Road; a separate Manhattan-based investigation ultimately led to the filing of charges against the website’s founder, Ross W. Ulbricht, who was convicted last month on numerous counts.
Mr. Force, while investigating Silk Road, “stole and converted to his own personal use a sizable amount of Bitcoins,” the digital currency that was used by buyers and sellers on the website and which he obtained in his undercover capacity, the complaint said.
“Rather than turning those Bitcoin over to the government, Force deposited them into his own personal accounts,” it added.
The complaint describes both former agents as members of a Baltimore-based task force that investigated Silk Road. The website had been the subject of investigations in several cities, including Chicago and New York.
The Baltimore investigation resulted in an indictment of Mr. Ulbricht on conspiracy and other charges, but that case has remained pending and the evidence in support of it was kept out of the New York trial, apparently because of the investigation into the agents.
Mr. Force had been employed as a D.E.A. special agent for about 15 years; he resigned in May 2014, shortly after the investigation into his activities began, the complaint says. Mr. Bridges had been a special agent of the Secret Service for about six years until he abruptly resigned on March 18, after learning he was a subject of the investigation, it says.
Mr. Force, 46, was arrested in Baltimore on Friday and was to appear before a magistrate judge there on Monday. Mr. Bridges, 32, of Laurel, Md., surrendered to the authorities in San Francisco and was to appear in court there on Monday morning.
At the time charges were announced against Mr. Ulbricht in October 2013 and the website was shut down, the authorities called Silk Road “the most sophisticated and extensive criminal marketplace on the Internet.”
Several thousand drug dealers and other vendors used the site from January 2011 through October 2013 to sell hundreds of kilograms of illegal drugs and other illicit goods to more than 100,000 buyers, according to charges filed in Manhattan.
The website generated more than $213 million in revenue during that period, and Mr. Ulbricht, operating under the pseudonym Dread Pirate Roberts, took millions of dollars in commissions, federal prosecutors in Manhattan charged.
Much of Silk Road’s allure to buyers and sellers was anonymity: The website operated on a hidden part of the Internet, out of the glare of law enforcement, and deals were transacted in Bitcoins, a digital currency that can be as hard to trace as cash.
Mr. Ulbricht’s defense lawyer, Joshua L. Dratel, argued during the trial that his client was not Dread Pirate Roberts, a character drawn from the book and movie “The Princess Bride.” Mr. Dratel conceded that Silk Road had been his client’s idea, but that Mr. Ulbricht had turned the website over to others before being lured back as a “fall guy” to be arrested.
Mr. Ulbricht was convicted on Feb. 4 of multiple counts; four of the charges, including distributing narcotics on the Internet and engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise, carry potential life sentences. He is to be sentenced on May 15.
At the trial, the government also accused Mr. Ulbricht of commissioning the murders of five people whom he saw as threats to his enterprise. Although the prosecutors said they found no evidence that anyone was harmed, they cited the murders-for-hire as evidence that Mr. Ulbricht was willing to use violence to protect his lucrative operation.
Actual text of complaint: http://cryptome.org/2015/03/force-001.pdf
By BENJAMIN WEISER and MATT APUZZOMARCH 30, 2015
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/31/nyregion/silk-road-case-federal-agents-charges.html
Two former federal agents have been charged with money laundering and fraud stemming from their investigation into Silk Road, the once-thriving black market website for drug dealing, a criminal complaint shows.
The former agents are Carl Mark Force IV, who worked for the Drug Enforcement Administration, and Shaun Bridges, who worked for the Secret Service.
Mr. Force was also charged with theft of government property and conflict of interest, according to the complaint, which was unsealed on Monday in federal court in San Francisco.
The charges stem from the agents’ role in one of the federal investigations into Silk Road; a separate Manhattan-based investigation ultimately led to the filing of charges against the website’s founder, Ross W. Ulbricht, who was convicted last month on numerous counts.
Mr. Force, while investigating Silk Road, “stole and converted to his own personal use a sizable amount of Bitcoins,” the digital currency that was used by buyers and sellers on the website and which he obtained in his undercover capacity, the complaint said.
“Rather than turning those Bitcoin over to the government, Force deposited them into his own personal accounts,” it added.
The complaint describes both former agents as members of a Baltimore-based task force that investigated Silk Road. The website had been the subject of investigations in several cities, including Chicago and New York.
The Baltimore investigation resulted in an indictment of Mr. Ulbricht on conspiracy and other charges, but that case has remained pending and the evidence in support of it was kept out of the New York trial, apparently because of the investigation into the agents.
Mr. Force had been employed as a D.E.A. special agent for about 15 years; he resigned in May 2014, shortly after the investigation into his activities began, the complaint says. Mr. Bridges had been a special agent of the Secret Service for about six years until he abruptly resigned on March 18, after learning he was a subject of the investigation, it says.
Mr. Force, 46, was arrested in Baltimore on Friday and was to appear before a magistrate judge there on Monday. Mr. Bridges, 32, of Laurel, Md., surrendered to the authorities in San Francisco and was to appear in court there on Monday morning.
At the time charges were announced against Mr. Ulbricht in October 2013 and the website was shut down, the authorities called Silk Road “the most sophisticated and extensive criminal marketplace on the Internet.”
Several thousand drug dealers and other vendors used the site from January 2011 through October 2013 to sell hundreds of kilograms of illegal drugs and other illicit goods to more than 100,000 buyers, according to charges filed in Manhattan.
The website generated more than $213 million in revenue during that period, and Mr. Ulbricht, operating under the pseudonym Dread Pirate Roberts, took millions of dollars in commissions, federal prosecutors in Manhattan charged.
Much of Silk Road’s allure to buyers and sellers was anonymity: The website operated on a hidden part of the Internet, out of the glare of law enforcement, and deals were transacted in Bitcoins, a digital currency that can be as hard to trace as cash.
Mr. Ulbricht’s defense lawyer, Joshua L. Dratel, argued during the trial that his client was not Dread Pirate Roberts, a character drawn from the book and movie “The Princess Bride.” Mr. Dratel conceded that Silk Road had been his client’s idea, but that Mr. Ulbricht had turned the website over to others before being lured back as a “fall guy” to be arrested.
Mr. Ulbricht was convicted on Feb. 4 of multiple counts; four of the charges, including distributing narcotics on the Internet and engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise, carry potential life sentences. He is to be sentenced on May 15.
At the trial, the government also accused Mr. Ulbricht of commissioning the murders of five people whom he saw as threats to his enterprise. Although the prosecutors said they found no evidence that anyone was harmed, they cited the murders-for-hire as evidence that Mr. Ulbricht was willing to use violence to protect his lucrative operation.
Actual text of complaint: http://cryptome.org/2015/03/force-001.pdf
